House of Eratosthenes

Be thankful for your girlfriend (or boyfriend, for that matter) who enjoys having fun. Be thankful for friends still in possession of a decent sense of humor, and a willingness to share same.

And spare a little bit of pity for the fellow with a feminist gal-pal.

Ok, so my boyfriend and I are kind of kinky. He got the idea to wear sexy costumes for each other on halloween, and I think it would be fun. So I did some investigating, and as I expected, most ‘his and her’ costumes consist of a fully clothed man and half-naked woman. This is issue number one.

Issue number two is the lovely outfits I will post at the end of my rant. They are the ‘Coroner’ and ‘Sexy Jane Doe’ or whatever. In otherwords, a man who’s job is to deal with dead people is looking at a sexy dead stranger. Yeah, I couldn’t find a costume where the man is dead. After seeing a whole one outfit for men being skimpy and the rest being complete while the girls are all showing at least some skin, this just set me off.

So, am I right being mad about the whole coroner and Jane Doe outfit? Am I just looking into it too much? Or is there a deliberate power dynamic being displayed?

Feministing is the long, tough, personal-record-setting eighty-mile bike ride under a blazing sun on a hot summer day. Hooters is the ice-cold mug of lager right afterward.

Can you imagine being around a “lady” like this on a regular basis? She demands the partying and revelry take a back seat to cultural reform…on the thirty-first of October fer chrissakes.

Where is this world. Where is this fantasy planet, in which an unpleasant, complaining woman holds more appeal to a gentleman than a damsel with a more pleasing disposition and a skimpier costume. This is the utopia you want? This is what you think you can bring about? What sort of lobotomy must take place upon the male mind to make your dreams come true, battleaxe. Men are visual creatures. We like looking at you, and your various parts, if you take the time and effort to make yourself look nice. It’s been that way for hundreds of years, perhaps thousands, and the true irony is that during that time it has been an unspoken fountainhead of real female power in our various societies, around the world.

Here you “feminists” are trying to get rid of it. Jousting at windmills. And doing a fairly stop-and-go, here-and-there, half-assed job of it.

Begone from my sight, you snarky grumblebunny thoroughly unpleasant termagant. Bring on the hot wings and ale. Wenches! The Emperor’s palate is parched! Step lively!

I have often thought that when Homer Simpson so eloquently said “Beer: the cause of and solution to, all of life’s little problems.”, someone should have stood up and said “Testosterone: the cause of and solution to, all life’s BIG problems.”

This is why feminism will not go away – if someone casually extolled the virtues of testosterone (instincts toward protection and gathering, production and work as status, etc), you couldn’t easily convert folks to only see the negatives (boorish, crass behavior, ogling, instincts of violence).
- wch | 10/30/2008 @ 10:10
Yeah well, here’s a secret everyone knows but nobody wants to mention: There’s nothing wrong with the ogling. To argue that there is, you have to posit an extreme case: Leering, to the point of self-embarrassment, intimidation, distraction and thuggery.

To the point where it’s outright obnoxious.

Now imagine how much more successful we’d be molding the world to MY personal desires, if only that standard was imposed on other things. Feminism itself can be obnoxious. Maybe we should decide whether or not to allow feminism, based on a fantasy that it’s become extraordinarily obnoxious in all the instances we care to sample.

Perhaps we could impose that standard on rap music. Perhaps we *should*.
- mkfreeberg | 10/30/2008 @ 11:07
Ya know… there was ONE small point I agree with in this person’s rant (as described here; I didn’t venture over to FemiFisting as I’m not feeling particularly masochistic today) and it doesn’t have one single thing to do with gender wars. That point: “the ‘Coroner’ and ‘Sexy Jane Doe’” costumes. Now the ranter may have confused a Doctor – Nurse set of costumes for a coroner’s outfit. But if it really WAS Coroner/Jane Doe, then… OMG. That’s just simple BAD TASTE, with hints of necrophilia thrown in for good measure. I just don’t find that amusing, at all. So… one teeny-tiny Attaboy amongst a deluge of Aw-Shits.
- Buck | 10/30/2008 @ 12:08
It looks to me like the problem is the women don’t want to be ogled by the “help”.
- Robert Mitchell Jr. | 10/30/2008 @ 12:45
I took a look at the costume – appears to be a Little Black Riding Hood costume. Not so bad.

The women who usually complain about this crap generally don’t have much going on the looks/figure department. It’s easier to blame piggish misogyny than lose a few pounds and hit the makeup counters at Sephora.
- Daphne | 10/30/2008 @ 13:30
MFK, you are correct that ogling is not in the same realm as the other displays of testosterone I mentioned, such as violence and other boorish behavior. But you won’t find me defending it unilaterally, whether or not I see something or nothing wrong with it.

My point is that if what they (the feminists) decry as evil has its roots in what we should hold dear (the instinct to become a fireman, or the guy who works his a** off and/or buys life insurance (or a plumbing business) to create/protect a nest egg), then it will always be tacitly accepted. What matters is who is doing the ogling. If Joe the plumber is ogling, I say ogle away.

It is right to ignore ogling if you believe (as I do, that) it is a byproduct of manliness (what I called testosterone), which should be heralded as good for society. Unfortunately, ogling has been defended without giving away the secret: that it comes from the same drive to create, take risks, build companies, etc. and we’re not going to throw that baby out with the bath water, if we know what’s good for us. And we do; this is America.

Not to take this into an Obama rant, but when that man extolls the virtue of spreading the wealth around, it, to my mind, is a slap in the face of every one who harnesses their (insert testosterone/manliness/instincts words here) for the good of themselves, for the good of society. Which is why Joe the plumber’s story became such a cause. Yourself first, Ayn Rand lovers, then society heals itself.

FWIW, testosterone was naturally selected, so these ladies who bad-mouth it should argue with Darwin, not me.
- wch | 10/30/2008 @ 14:38
My wife will be cursing you this weekend, Morgan, as I fondle her boobs and smack her ass at every turn, even in public, God help me. Still, and hold your breath for this one, she has actually admiited that she likes it. Gasp!

She’ll have no choice but to send me to Hooters on Sunday to watch boobs – I mean football – just to get me off of her long enough to feed the baby.
- Andy | 10/30/2008 @ 18:35
Hmmm. “To avoid certain types of people”. Never thought of it that way. With me, it’s mostly about the the oggling, and the camaraderie amongst the people with whom I go.

As far as the “being wired” for it, I know that right down to the wiring closet inside of me in a way that no female will understand unless they admit to and think about the things that are wired into THEIR wiring closets and relate on that level. ‘Cause they have wiring closets, too.

Yesterday, we were driving across campus, coming back from a meeting, while one of my co-workers was explaining something work-related. An attractive woman crossed the street in front of us, dressed in a very nice skirt-suit, navy blue, knee-length skirt and modest heels. And very nice calves.

I didn’t see her at first, but that co-worker’s voice stopped, mid-thought, suddenly, and I looked up, curious as to what it was that halted him. When I saw her, I knew immediately what stopped his train of thought. It was not a voluntary stop. His thought process was interrupted by a biological high-priority interrupt that he had to fight to overcome and continue talking.

Men have to do this every day. Not complaining, mind you. Most of us have adapted — put a curb on — our animal instincts and now it really is akin to suddenly seeing a beautiful tree in it’s fall or spring splendor, or a mountain or flower or any other visually beautiful thing. I see it as a GOOD thing.

I don’t whistle (except at my wife or good friends), or butt-slap or boob grab. I just … appreciate.

When Chippendales is forced to hire female dancers for it’s revues, the jig will be completely up.
- philmon | 01/15/2009 @ 13:34
Hmmm. “To avoid certain types of people”. Never thought of it that way.

Hehehe. You don’t live in Cali.

Car seats. Ten shot clips, handgun registrations and waiting periods. Smog check racket. Chicken laws.

The place is a nanny state. They’d pass a law that all waitresses have to be fat, ugly and over 45 if they thought the public would be accepting of it, and within 5 years that very thing might happen.
- mkfreeberg | 01/15/2009 @ 14:24

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Retreat to the OasisThursday, October 30th, 2008

Retreat to the Oasis
Thursday, October 30th, 2008