Dear Mr. Thong Inventor,

I would like to preface this letter by saying that your work has made a large yet incredibly skimpy contribution to my adolescent years. And while I do believe in the nobleness of your cause, I am rather puzzled by the method to the madness of such an invention. As I hold up the tiny piece of fabric that is my underwear, several questions come to mind, such as:

Which came first: The thong, or “The Thong Song”?
The first time I heard The Thong Song, I was 11-years-old. Try explaining to a sixth grader, still under-clad with flower-print Hanes granny panties, the concept of a thong. Watching a leprechaun of a man do cartwheels on the beach doesn’t really do that good of a job of explaining the exact science behind the thong. In fact, I’m pretty sure I thought he was singing about summertime footwear up until 2001, when I realized I needed to wear this contraption to be socially acceptable.

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I’ve never been a big fan of theme parties. Just like perfectly matched outfits, to me they seem contrived, cliché, outdated. But college freshmen (and many of my CollegeCandy peers) seem to love the experience of a costume party. I too have to give props to the really creative ideas that people have come up with (although I can’t seem to recall any at the time; that’s how rare they are), but for the most part, the only theme parties that exist and thrive in college are characterized by sexism. I mean, CEOs and corporate hoes? Is there anyone that sees that and thinks, “hey, girls can dress up as CEOs too!”

Even when it’s not implicitly stated (and it usually is, on the Facebook invite: “girls who don’t dress sexy aren’t allowed in”), why do guys get to slap on a button-down and be the cool, prestigious things – CEOs, rock stars, golf pros – while girls just have to dress like “hoes”?

With Halloween looming, this is an incredibly relevant issue. In the immortal words of Cady Heron: “Halloween is the one night a year when a girl can dress like a total slut and no other girls can say anything about it.” It’s true. Halloween seems to be the one night when the cattiness and judgments that surround one girl’s wardrobe choice seem to fall away, and girls take full advantage of this. For most girls, finding a sexy costume takes priority over creating a clever one; to say that most girls don’t aspire to be praised for their minds on Halloween night is to put it mildly.

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Let me take you way back to yesterday afternoon, when after a punishing Pilates class, I decided to treat myself to something delicious and sugary (the calories don’t count if you stuff yourself right after working out, right?). So I headed over to the Wafels and Dinges truck, an amazing mobile Belgian waffle vendor that usually parks itself near my school on Mondays.

Maybe my eyes were watering from the 32-degree weather, or maybe I was looking anxious because of all the stuff I had to get done later that day. For whatever reason, though, when I stepped up to get my waffle, the dude working the truck took a look at my face and started clicking his tongue disapprovingly. “Tell me what’s wrong,” he said. “Why don’t you smile?”

I was taken aback. Why was this guy assuming that there was something wrong with me just because the sides of my mouth didn’t happen to be turned up? And even if I had been upset, what made him think he had the right to pry into the personal life of a total stranger? I stuttered something vague and grabbed my food, happy to get the hell away from that truck. And, okay, still psyched to eat an awesome waffle. Read More »

Guys sure know how to make a woman feel loved and appreciated. Especially if they spring for the coordinating accessories. Thanks, men!

Straight men spend approximately 3/4 of their day (OK, probably more) wishing that whatever they happened to be looking at involved boobs. As such, establishments that cater to straight men, like sports bars, realize that by filling their place of business with scantily clad women, they can get men to come in and buy… anything, actually. But does that make it OK to be one of those scantily clad women?

On one side of the argument are supporters of the girls who work there and like it. They say it’s just like any other waitressing gig, except that the outfits are smaller. Some girls find that they can make better tips in places like these, because the men are trying to win them over. They aren’t having sex, they’re just wearing small outfits – outfits that are quite a bit bigger than, say, what most of us wear to the beach. Some even argue that a part of what we fight for with feminism is the right to work in any profession we choose, even if that profession does pander to men, so to put a limit on what a woman can and can’t do with her own body or her own career would be anti-feminist. Read More »

For those of you still hiding out underneath your comforters, emerge and rejoice!  For it is National Man Day today and what holiday could be better?  I can hear you now, “But, I’m not a man…how could I possibly celebrate this wondrous yet highly sexist holiday?”  Just use the following as a guide for your behavior today and no one will notice your lack of penis.

Find Pointy Objects - If it is sharp, dangerous, shiny, and/or pointy, go play with it.  Poke your friends, have pseudo-lightsaber fights, etc.  The more dangerous the object, the more fun you can potentially have with it.

Enjoy a Short Attention Span - The only thing that you should be doing for longer than 5 mins is going to the bathroom or watching TV (sports and action movies only, of course).

Don’t Call People - If you are dating someone, don’t call them.  Wait for them to call you and possibly send a text tomorrow or the next day.  You know, whatevs.  You may, however, take some calls from your friends but you should communicate mostly in grunts and keep all conversations under 13 seconds. Read More »

Dear Mr. Thong Inventor,

I would like to preface this letter by saying that your work has made a large yet incredibly skimpy contribution to my adolescent years. And while I do believe in the nobleness of your cause, I am rather puzzled by the method to the madness of such an invention. As I hold up the tiny piece of fabric that is my underwear, several questions come to mind, such as:

• Which came first: The thong, or “The Thong Song”?

The first time I heard the thong song, I was 11-years-old. Try explaining to a sixth grader, still under-clad with flower-print Hanes grannie panties, the concept of a thong. Watching a leprechaun of a man do cartwheels on the beach doesn’t really do that good of a job of explaining the exact science behind the thong. In fact, I’m pretty sure I thought he was singing about summertime footwear up until 2001, when I realized I needed to wear this contraption to be socially acceptable.

• Where the devil did you get this genius idea?

Was it a public service project? Did you see one too many VPLs (Visible Panty Lines, for you not-in-the-knows) and proclaim “I’ve had it! I’m inventing buttless underwear!” To you, Mr. Thong Inventor, going commando just wasn’t an option. Now that point I can understand, as I probably have not washed my jeans since the opening night of “Sex and the City.” And who really likes walking around with that “I’m wearing the pant equivalent of dirty underwear” feeling all day? Yeah, neither do I. So really, Mr. T.I, you were the answer to my laundry-lazy, VPL-phobic prayers.

• How the hell did you get it to catch on?

No seriously. It takes pure skill to get a woman to try on a permanent wedgie, let alone make it a long lasting trend in the sexy lingerie industry. Think about it: it’s a tiny scrap of cotton, satin, silk, or pearls (hey, I dunno what kinda stuff you’re into…) that is designed to chill between your butt cheeks all day. But women still go crazy for them! They even tease other women that don’t wear their underwear up their ass. Read More »

Thanks to satirical cartoons and recorded history, it’s pretty common knowledge that Walt Disney was a nut bag. Besides being obsessed with cryogenically freezing his own head, the guy was an anti-Semite and hired Nazi rocket scientists to design his rides.

Then there’s the racism and sexism in all of the cartoons his company has produced.

But I guess we’d all thought, with the advent of the first ever black female lead in a Disney cartoon, that the company had turned a new, desperate leaf and was actually interested in being a culturally aware organization rather then a profit-hungry global conglomerate steeped in Nazi tradition (Did you know?: Pirates of the Caribbean is powered by the OCCULT!).

We thought wrong. Looks like theres’ a huge labor dispute going on right now between Disney and a few thousand hotel employees, which was brought to a head today when protesters marched on the California Disney locations, dressed (hilariously) as Disney characters.

Bewildered tourists in Disney T-shirts and caps, some pushing strollers, filed past the commotion and gawked at the costumed picketers getting hauled away. The protest shut down a major thoroughfare outside Disneyland and California Adventure for nearly an hour.

“It’s changing my opinion of Disneyland,” said tourist Amanda Kosato, who was visiting from north of Melbourne, Australia. “Taking away entitlements stinks.” Read More »

Every once in a while, your editors come across something that hurts them to the bottom of their core. Usually, they just swivel towards one another and scream about it until everything feels better, but this week, they are separated by many a mile. So, what happens when a report comes out about the iPhone being sexist, and there’s no one to scream to?

We IM our asses off.

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From the moment John Edwards dropped out of the race in January, everyone knew this would be no ordinary primary season. Remaining contenders Obama and Clinton were very similar politically and both were making history by challenging the twin traditional societal norms of racism and sexism.

The upshot being of course that as the death knell sounds for the Clinton campaign politicos are not only discussing how she lost politically but also how the “female-thing” influenced voters.

I myself am hesitant to immediately point to sexism as the cause of her loss—just as I would have been equally reluctant to point to racism had Obama lost. Yet the uphill battle that Hillary’s campaign faced in the news media is a reminder of the difficulties of being a dominant and ambitious woman in today’s society.

While during the campaign we heard the tired old argument that a woman is too weak to be president especially during a time of war and that world leaders wouldn’t respect her (umm… yes let’s just discount Margaret Thatcher shall we?), Hillary came under intense fire for her personality as a woman. Read More »