July 28, 2009

Let's talk about "The Hot Issue" of Cosmo.

I was just waiting in line at Walgreens, trying to buy some toothpaste, and this grabbed... well, I don't want to say it grabbed me by the balls, but that's the kind of thing it would say, just like it would say "5 things that can BLOW a JOB interview."

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Cosmo is just so sexually aggressive. It tires me out. It makes me want to to find out how not to look tired. Get hit on all the time? Get hit on to annoy your friends? Can't I just quietly contemplate whether my breasts are normal or what pittance I might spend to make my skin amazing?

And now you want to tell me about 125 sex moves — in rank order, no less. 125! What if I'd just like some — maybe 40 — little tiny ways to connect with a guy? (One guy!) Not even sex ways, you know? Duh! Sex is just the 41st way, and we already know about it. It's so desperate to need that one thing broken down into 125 parts.

And maybe I don't want thousands of men sent over the edge. That sounds dangerous! Like some kind of war. Over the edge! Come on, back off a bit, ladies. Cosmo has been handing out secrets to drive men wild for decades, to the point where I've been wondering why the streets aren't, by now, teeming with rampaging wild men, all these secrets being so widely dispersed among so many women for so long.

Then there are the 5 things — always with the lists — you should never let your "gyno" do. That underlining, frankly, scares me. You mean there are some rather disturbing things you might occasionally let your gyno do, but there are 5 of them that you really never should let him/her do? What kind of crazy shit are gynos trying to get away with, anyway?

And that leaves us with the Orgasm Whisperer, which I guess is like the Horse Whisperer or the Dog Whisperer, but for orgasms, so supposedly this is a man — woman? — who is has a special, highly effective way of talking to orgasms and extracting appropriate behavior from them. I don't really understand. Maybe it's a little like playing Mozart recordings to unborn babies in the womb. Still, if the orgasm is there, what's the problem? And if the orgasm is not there, what are you whispering to?

Oh, lord, I just want to know some beauty tricks from top models and the real deal on the guys Taylor Swift sings about.

97 comments:

Leather Daddy said...

I demand diversity. I demand Althouse reviews of back issues of Honcho.

lucid said...

Great post, Ann. Made me temporarily sane (and I'm male).

rhhardin said...

Thirty exercises to strengthen your smile muscles.

Unknown said...

When did women magazines become to crass?

kentuckyliz said...

Apparently Katy Perry grabbed Hollywood by the balls while kissing a girl and liking it.

It's just so *tiring* to be inundated by such sexual saturation constantly in this obsessed culture.

Leaves no room for tingling innocence and a shy blush and imagination and desire and anticipation and ravishment and bonding and dare I say love.

Helen Gurley Brown was a hoor who hoorified our culture. Thanks a lot.

Joe said...

The biggest problem with Cosmo is that the blurbs on the cover are far more titillating that the articles which are dumb, boring or both.

traditionalguy said...

Wow! That is advice overload. It reminds me of golf lessons in Golf Magazines. If you tried to remember all that advice you would freeze up in the back swing, if you ever swing at all. Forty ways to entertain all the men hitting on you constantly...besides sex. How does a woman remember that much. A golf swing is simple if you get in a proper stance and then swing it, no thinking allowed. So maybe females on the make just need to assume their best stance and then just swing it. You should get the most balls in the hole that way.

The Crack Emcee said...

Damn it, Ann, you're getting on my good side again - and I ain't got one!!!

Good job.

The Macho Response

BTW, I wish you'd comment on this.

traditionalguy said...

Help. Crack has is sneaking another Palin thread in thru a crack in this thread.

Bissage said...

I have no idea what is on that list of 5 things you should never let your gynecologist do.

This said, I state with all confidence that one of those 5 should be struck off and replaced with: Never let your gynecologist inflate your vagina with compressed helium just to hear what it sounds like on the way out.

This sort of advice really should go without saying but one can’t be too careful about these things; you know, a penny's worth of prevention and all that.

Ralph L said...

It just proves the saying: Show me a Cosmo girl, and I'll show you a guy whose tired of bonking her. Why else is she reading this crap?

traditionalguy said...

I have a terrible idea. The Democrats should get Bissage to re-write their health care Monster Bill so that they wouldn't need to explain it to anyone. Everyone would agree to whatever Bissage writes. Then after destroying the private sector, any amendments can be passed at midnight next week.

Freeman Hunt said...

If aliens who knew nothing of us picked up Cosmo to research our lives, they'd think that giving a male human an orgasm was the most difficult achievement possible.

KCFleming said...

Or that it even required assistance.

Freeman Hunt said...

If you need a repertoire of "125 moves," I think that might indicate that someone needs a trip to the doctor. Or that out of 125 moves, you are performing ALL of them very poorly.

Freeman Hunt said...

Well, at least 124 of them anyway.

KCFleming said...

5 things you should never let your gyno do:

1. Make a smiley face with your uterus after the c-section, hold it up and show the hubby (I was there).

2. Ask why you have milk duds "in there." Hey, doc, none of yer beeswax! (personal experience)

3. Fail to suppress a smile when you ask about the Fireballs of the Eucharist (fibroids of the uterus ...I think).

4. Let him sing Ooooooh ....does your uterus hang low, can you swing it to and fro, can you tie it in a knot, can you tie it in a bow? (I swear to God he sang it, my teacher).

5. Say whoopsy! at any time.

KCFleming said...

Does the Cosmo article on 125 sex moves have diagrams, like in those old dance move instructions, with all the feet?

Could be useful.
I mean, for someone I know.

srfwotb said...

A FOM e'd that her local legal weed dispensary comp'd her some kind of a peanut butter bar that made her "trip balls"...

And I was completely jealous - even though I've never been weed woman and don't think weed could have that kind of effect on me.

So I sat on a high balcony and had some wine and kept the sun in my line-of-sight and thought Exalted Thoughts...and felt much the same.

No one knows why.

This only relates to Cosmo in that "balls" are involved. I gave up reading Cosmo at 23. Helen Gurly Brown- yeech. What else do you need to know?

Freeman Hunt said...

"Gynos do unneeded hysterectomies for money. Do not let them. Take the blue pill. Further, you should never let your gyno make any money. And I mean it." -- Sent in by reader B. Obama

KCFleming said...

And Get hit on all the time?

What is the requirement, besides one male? I mean, absent a willing partner, guys will hit on themselves.

dick said...

Who's Taylor Swift? and why should I care.

RLB_IV said...

Ladies, do you kagels.

Freeman Hunt said...

Unless you're in a very specific line of work, I don't see the use of knowing how men, as a population, rank "sex moves." Don't you really only need data on one particular man who may or may not agree with the population of men as a whole?

traditionalguy said...

Freeman Hunt... Good question. The readers are either curious if they are missing out on a big all night of endurance sex because they are boring, or they are wondering if they can get a little attention if they F--K his brains out. The Cosmo secret is that the answer is really no. Just make friends first and share emotions and the rest happens. But like Golf Magazines. Cosmo only exists to sell ads for the equiptment used in the Sport. Any advice that women already have God given equiptment would not sell to any advertisers of the best new and improved beauty devices and sex tricks.

Anonymous said...

Never let your gynecologist inflate your vagina with compressed helium just to hear what it sounds like on the way out.

Years ago there was a movie called "Chatterbox," about a woman who could talk through her, well, you can figure that one out. Hearing her talk with a helium-enabled Donald Duck voice would be a cool idea for a sequel.

Peter

Fred4Pres said...

My wife reads More. I suggest you all you ladies check it out.

Skeptical said...

If I ever had any uncertainty about whether I had a crush on Freeman Hunt, her 9:07 cleared it away for good.

Fred4Pres said...

I read National Geographic, Sunset and Boys Life. They just happen to be around so I read them. They are all pretty good.

Anonymous said...

Perhaps the silliest magazines of all are the bodybuilding magazines. I'll be polite and not name any specific titles. They're massively thick but consist primarily of long advertorials for dubious supplements, most of which sounds like badly written science fiction novels. Actual editorial content is limited to vaguely homoerotic photospreads and absurd training-advice articles which seem to be recycled every few months.

Peter

I'm Full of Soup said...

Hahaha a whole new joke genre - The Blue Pill.

I see a lucrative career in that for someone Freeman. But do it fast before Seinfeld "borrows" it to try and revive his act.

Steven said...

"How Katy Perry grabbed Hollywood by the balls"?

Well, let's see, by singing a song that plays to the classic male fantasy of a threesome with a song whose lyrics repetitively reassure the listener that she's into men while mentioning she enjoyed kissing a girl?

Look, I can appreciate an appeal to cheap exhibitionism and mindless lust fulfillment. But it's a damned stupid headline.

Moose said...

Let me guess - you were writing this while bottomless in bed.

No?

Freeman Hunt said...

Oh AJ, you don't need a new joke genre...

You just need the blue pill.

Alex said...

what really irritates me as a sports fan is that Roger Federer hangs out with Anna Wintour. One represents true greatness, and the other represents all that is shallow in society.

Methadras said...

The legacy of the She-Cunt Brown lives on.

MadisonMan said...

I don't read Cosmo. My suspicion is that, like Parents Magazine, article ideas are recycled every 6-9 years.

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

What I want to know, dear Cosmo, is when should I call my trick from last weekend.

I texted him after we did it on Saturday, on Sunday, telling him I had a good time. He texted me bad and said he did as well but then said "take care". How should I take that "take care"? Take care as it was fun take care never see you again?

And finally love Taylor to death but it is really all about Peaches this summer. Get with it Althouse and get with it Cosmo.

Peaches, she rules.

Matt Brown said...

125 seems like such a random number. Why didn't Cosmo pick a more sexually-oriented number? Like, say, 69?

Ann Althouse said...

I don't know thing 1 about Taylor Swift. I hope you understand that.

srfwotb said...

Yeah, he meant "See ya."

Call him when he's drunk.

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

Peaches hot songs this summer: Slippery Dick-video starring Divine and Fuck The Pain Away starring Mayberry.

Fabulous.

Watch and enjoy.

srfwotb said...

...and vulnerable.

Jason (the commenter) said...

What's great about Cosmo is all the articles are completely made up. The people who write them have no idea what they're talking about.

Meade said...

I don't know thing 1 about Taylor Swift. I hope you understand that.

I do understand that.

But somehow it wouldn't surprise me if she knows the real deal on the 125 moves rated by all those guys she sings about.

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

And the gay anthem this year is Kelly Rowland, from Destiny's Child.

When Love Takes Over.

It is on every DJ's list this summer from Abiza to Ptown.

Once you hear the pounding beat you will understand why.

Taylor always slings her pussy into Ptown to do a summer show. All us 30 plus queens go and pay our respects.

Did you like the pictures of the little fawns I sent you from my parents farm Althouse?

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

Meade, must you rub it in to all of us that love and lust after your beautiful, sexy, stimulating and smart gal?

How's that for kissing the Divine Miss Althouse's ass?

Meade said...

So I googled Taylor Swift and this is one thing I learned:

The New York Times described Swift as "one of pop's finest songwriters, country’s foremost pragmatist and more in touch with her inner life than most adults"

I hope she knows which parts of her inner life she should never NEVER share with her gyno.

Jason (the commenter) said...

Titus : Peaches hot songs this summer: Slippery Dick-video starring Divine and Fuck The Pain Away starring Mayberry.

1. That was from 2006.

2. The song is nothing compared to divine.

3. The hot song from Peaches this summer is Lose You.

Meade said...

Aw, Titus, you are such the foremost pragmatist.

Penny said...

I see that they did identify this as "THE HOT ISSUE" with a bold red circle.

I can hardly wait for "THE HOT GREEN ISSUE", with helpful hints on how to land your very own climate scientist.

Ann Althouse said...

@Titus Yes, the fawns were cute. Now, if your sister were to wake up one morning and see fauns, that would be cooler.

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

Did I call them fauns? Typically me.

When Love Takes Over is I think Althouse and Meades song. It is a song about love and emotions and intensity.

Watch it enjoy.

And by the way Kelly Rowland is totally hot in that video.

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

Srf thanks for affirming my insecurites. Much appreciated.

chuck b. said...

Peaches? Are we talking about Peaches? I like the Miss Piggy. NSFW!

Penny said...

One of the magazines I subscribed to went belly up, and the publishers decided to finish out my year with Glamour. I was not pleased.

Until now! I happen to have that issue with Taylor Swift and "The Real Deal on All Those Guys She Sings About".

Here's how this REALLY goes inside the magazine.

They ask her if she intends to tone down using the real names of people she writes about in her songs now that she is famous. She says she is just a regular person after all, and that she even wrote in the first person on her MySpace page.

End of this subject in the magazine.

Peter Hoh said...

125?

Just a week ago, 101 seemed to be an adequate number.

Chennaul said...

Your Peaches looks like Boy George and she is pissed.

Needs some Herb.

chuck b. said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
chuck b. said...

Herb? Need herb? NSFW

Chennaul said...

Oh and I leave you with this-

One of the crappiest lyrics of all time-

Morning has broken, black bird has spoken.

Holy hell the Seventies-

SUCKED!

Chennaul said...

Wait-

crap I have to follow chuck's link.

Curiousity....

Chennaul said...

Hey I actually like 3 6 Mafia the only thing is well when you actually listen to the lyrics and then I only get pulled over by the cops when I am listening to rap...

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

I miss Divine terribly.

Shoot Your Shot.

Walk Like A Man.

I Am Beautiful.

She really was an original.

Jason (the commenter) said...

Divine was awesome in Pink Flamingos.

"Kill everyone now! Condone first degree murder! Advocate cannibalism!"

srfwotb said...

@twsicmt...

...Insecurities...well, you never know...maybe you _got_ to him and it made him want to put some distance...

blake said...

I think the problem with the full-on assault is that when you see the presumably innocent header of "5 Things That Can Blow A Job Interview", it doesn't seem so innocent.

Chennaul said...

Awwww gawd-

The Miss Piggy link

LMAO, now I really have to go-

but-

thanks for that chuck!

Alex said...

What is with Charles Johnson the last year or so? He spends more time bashing Republicans and Rush Limbaugh then going after Obama's socialist plans. I think any day now he'll declare himself to a Democrat.

Ralph L said...

I texted him after we did it on Saturday, on Sunday
Big mistake, he was probably still sore from your monster hog. Only girls are so insecure they need immediate reassurance they weren't just a piece of meat.

Morning Has Broken was a children's hymn from the 1930's.

I'm getting Cheryl Smith's subscription to Better Homes and Gardens. They've gone green, but apparently the new wall color is white.

Anonymous said...

They are no better than Hustler I would say, see the words Hot, Sexy etc.... NExt time you go anywhere wear sun glasses and just do selective looking! what else can you do , you are a animal to be noosed!

Revenant said...

"says on the cover '100 Ways to Please Your Man' by... some lady. Come on man, there ain't no 100 ways. That list is 4 things long. Suck his dick, play with his balls, fix him a sandwich and don't talk so damn much!"

[Dave Chappelle]

Chase said...

Begs the questions:

1)Who actually pays money and buys Cosmo?

2)Why do they buy it?

Seriously.

Chase said...

I read National Geographic, Sunset and Boys Life.

Boy's Life?

Seriously - do the Boy Scouts still publish that?

KCFleming said...

At my age, most of the 125 moves that send me over the edge involve pathological drivers, excruciatingly slow shoppers, playing basketball, dog owners taking the pooch to crap on my lawn, and politicos trying to empty my pockets. None are are terribly desirable.

Most of the time, Intercourse and Climax are just towns in Pennsylvania, and it takes 4 hours and 50 minutes to get from one to the other.

Jason (the commenter) said...

I think Althouse secretly wants to be in Cosmo. How they could spin it: "Hot Sexting Tips from Blogger Ann Althouse" or maybe, "Are Bras Ruining Our Sex Lives?"

knox said...

I wouldn't be surprised if a couple of those articles aren't even in the magazine. Just throw some provocative headlines up front, fill the rest with ads.

Jennifer said...

That cover grabbed me the other day for an entirely different reason. I started a blog post about it, then got lazy.

Whatever happened to models? That's what I want to know. Just this month, Katy Perry on Cosmo, Fergie on Marie Claire, Katherine Heigl on InStyle, Miley Cyrus on Elle, Zooey Deschanel on Self, the list goes on... Not one of the major titles had a model on the cover.

How long has this been going on? Why is it going on? I like models, I'm tired of starlets.

Defenseman Emeritus said...

Titus said: "I miss Divine terribly."

I miss Divinyls terribly.

Fortunately YouTube has the video for I Touch Myself.

Christy said...

Helen Gurley Brown was notorious for insisting that Health 101 bits were slipped onto articles, frequently as total non sequiturs. She truly was on a mission.

Fred4Pres said...

Chase, yes they still publish Boys Life. My cubscout son gets it for being a cubscout, so copies are laying around. I like to read Scouts In Action becuase it was my favorite part when I was a boy. They even podcast it now (although I have not gone that far).

My 11 year old daughter could tell Ann everything she needs to know (or doesn't need to know) about Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift is fine with me, my daughter could be listening to things far far worse.

And seriously about More, my wife like it because it celebrates looking good past 40 without all the BS of the other magazines.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

"Dr. T": Women are *incapable* of being bad luck by themselves. It's men make 'em that way.

Dr T and the Women (2000)

William said...

The wisdom of age is mostly the atrophying of libido. Many are not above Cosmo but past it.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

This is why I began buying cooking magazines at the check out stand.

A MUCH more efficient way to a man's heart and to great sex. They actually work unlike those stupid self absorbed articles in Cosmo.

Nothing quite as aphrodisical (is that even a word) as anticipating a rum laced creme brulee following a kick ass rib eye steak and ceasar salad dinner. Or so says my husband. :-D

The Dude said...

@DBQ - you prove once again, that all the good ones are taken.

Ann Althouse said...

Titus: "Did I call them fauns? Typically me."

No, you didn't. I was just being whimsical. Typically me.

Ann Althouse said...

Jason: "I think Althouse secretly wants to be in Cosmo."

No, not at all. My big magazine reading days were in the 70s, when I actually had a job reading magazines. We read everything, including all the women's magazines (to produce a market research report), and my view of Cosmopolitan was that it was for a type of women that I didn't identify with at all. I think at the time I would have said: secretaries.

Methadras said...

Tituswhenshouldicallmytrickfromlastweekend said...

I miss Divine terribly.
Shoot Your Shot.
Walk Like A Man.
I Am Beautiful.
She really was an original.


Lust In The Dust. Nuff said.

Ralph L said...

You mean wanna-be-sluts, instead of actual ones?

Intercourse and Climax are just towns in Pennsylvania,
In 7th grade, our field trip took the train from Intercourse to Paradise. No where near 4 hours, so no embarrassing calls to the doctor.

The rude part was that we toured the chocolate factory, but didn't go to Hershey Park. Someone should have been fired.

Methadras said...

Jennifer said...
That cover grabbed me the other day for an entirely different reason. I started a blog post about it, then got lazy.
Whatever happened to models? That's what I want to know. Just this month, Katy Perry on Cosmo, Fergie on Marie Claire, Katherine Heigl on InStyle, Miley Cyrus on Elle, Zooey Deschanel on Self, the list goes on... Not one of the major titles had a model on the cover.
How long has this been going on? Why is it going on? I like models, I'm tired of starlets.


This has been going on for years. Stars and their agents work with magazines to get their little precious clients on covers or for interviews because for the same amount of money, or maybe even for less, they can get someone famous, not a model that no one knows. It's a twofer. They get the cover, but they also get an interview and slap it in the last few pages between the remnants of previous articles about douching with coconut oil and astrologers hawking their nonsense. Cover/interview all in one magazine.

Cover models are going the way of the dodo bird. No one wants to see a model and then have to flip through the magazine to look for the interview of the famous name slapped on the front page next to the models face. Besides, haven't you seen the trend to get hollywood names to do all kinds of things from cooking shows, to doing cameos on reality shows, etc. etc. The biggest intrusion of Hollywood stars has been in animation movies. Good voice actors have been completely displaced by Hollywood stars lending their voices to animations because Hollywood thinks big names on animations will draw crowds. It's just a weird bizzaro world of stupid.

Ralph L said...

The small company where I worked in the 80's had a secretary who admitted to me (not long after she was hired) that she'd had to leave her last job because she'd slept with all the men in the office.

Her beautiful predecessor had started as a receptionist, banged the (married, then separated, then widowed) VP, and gone to programming school on the company dime, with no contract, so she quit (and dumped him) as soon as she found a programming job elsewhere.

So forget the wanna-be.

blake said...

Good voice actors have been completely displaced by Hollywood stars lending their voices to animations because Hollywood thinks big names on animations will draw crowds. It's just a weird bizzaro world of stupid.

Preach it, brother!

knox said...

.... as if we don't get bombarded by celebrities enough as it is.

Ralph L said...

The best part of getting older is that I've never heard of 90% of them.

Freeman Hunt said...

I agree with Jennifer. I miss the days of Linda Evangelista and Christy Turlington everywhere. Bring back the models.

Chennaul said...

Ralph-

Geez maybe it wasn't the lyrics, it was the delivery.

Cat Stevens that sad sack singing....


well...

Sokmnkee said...

I'm obviously VERY MARRIED and making fun of Cosmo's cover stories is what I do for kicks while waiting in the check-out line. I always say that whoever writes the articles have obviously never gotten laid and are still hopeful. As for that 1,001 ways to drive your man mad--nonsense. Just hide the remote. Works at our house. LOLOLOL