Epic Meeting Disappoints/Book Review

So I went to the Laura Sessions Stepp meet-and-greet at Politics and Prose yesterday. Perhaps there was a bit too much hype. I've been getting e-mails from people asking me what I had in store for her. Well, I had no interest in being banned from Politics and Prose and it's hard to nail someone (in the Colbert sense, not the Unhooked sense) who has the podium. So when Wonkette said that "this Q&A is not to be missed," I cringed a little. LSS was asked two dozen questions and only two of them could be considered negative.

Naturally, I was one of those two.

I refuse to pay for a recording of LSS talking, so, here's the gist of my question:

"You've referred to women as the traditional "sexual gatekeepers" who traditionally have the role of regulating teenage sexuality. Since you also claim that human beings need to learn how to properly love, are you arguing that a woman's role in a relationship is to be nothing more than to be loving? How is this role different from previous roles that women have had and shed such as the submissive homemaker?"

That's not a terrible question, is it? Of course I got no answer other than that she is only focused on women and how they're hurt by hooking up. She would never dream of speaking for men. Her husband would never forgive her! (The audience totally LOL'ed.)

I don't really buy that. If women are really the sexual gatekeepers, that implies that men are the sexual "keymasters." This is guilty of both being an oversimplified, cliched sexual metaphor and also of claiming men are best suited with their traditional status of "players." This goes back to men being the Lotharios while women are the damsels in distress. Men can handle hooking up with as many female partners as humanly possible. Women can't. We've moved past that. You can make the argument that the hook-up culture (I'll give LSS the benefit of the doubt and admit this exists even if she is only using the most extreme examples in her book) is empty and unfulfilling. But to say it hits women harder than men and using outdated gender roles as one's only evidence is insulting.

Other obnoxious comments from LSS yesterday were that women are naturally more romantic (using, I swear to God, the popularity of Norah Jones to confirm this) and that was just the way it is. Hooking up proves that this isn't "just the way it is" and her nine self-selected females she followed around for a year aren't going to prove otherwise. She went out of her way to choose nine girls who had a problem with the "hook-up culture." Her conclusions are therefore inherently flawed and for her to speak of this generation needing to learn how to love is fantastically condescending. The divorce rate is already at 50% so it's not like we need any help mucking things up even more.

I'm as uncomfortable with middle school oral sex rings as anyone else. And if Stepp's descriptions of high school are remotely accurate, then I'm not really comfortable with that either. Those are minors making dangerous choices that could have horrifying long-term consequences. Call me a prude, but I don't think 15-year-olds should be sleeping around and getting hammered every weekend. But for the love of God, please leave college students alone. Hooking up does not negatively impact grades. It does not turn people into emotionless shells. It is not a sign of addictive behavior. If someone is depressed because they're sleeping around and can't get a steady boyfriend, well, my advice would be to stop sleeping around. If people can't handle this as adults, then, well, the problem isn't the culture but the person. And if this person has a different sexual partner every week, well, you really can't blame my generation for that.

Reading Unhooked, I was stunned how many times I thought to myself, wow, these girls are really slutty. The use of sexual outliers doesn't impress me. Unless things have drastically changed in the two years since I went to college, I can safely argue that most women, and men, just aren't this sexually adventurous. The book is alarmist. If the people who were at Politics and Prose last night represent Stepp's target audience, then her target audience is significantly older than me. I resent the alarmist tone since it makes me and my peers look like deviants.

Here I am reviewing a book I haven't even finished yet. So, let me finish up with a few notes:

1. Laura Sessions Stepp totally signed my book. When I asked her to sign it to my name (which sounds an awful lot like my pseudonym Rusty) she totally recognized me. This isn't me being full of myself. My friends caught it too. This experience was both thrilling and frightening.

2. I obviously have problems with the way this book was handled by the author, but let it be known that Mrs. Stepp was a fairly good speaker who left a favorable impression on even the younger members of the audience. She was gracious to me even though I was transparently trying to trap her and it was cute to see her friends, family, neighbors and former students (she was a professor at GW) come out to support her. Would I want to be in a bar with her talking about blow jobs? Heavens, no. But she did leave a favorable impression. One friend told me she was expecting, based on how I treat her here, Laura Sessions Stepp to either be a judgmental demon or a total prude. She is neither. This is why I should stop going to events that feature people I mock. I am a big softie.

3. When I am finally done with this book, I will be posting the Top-10 funniest quotes. There are some doozies.

4. A big thank you to The Bee in DC for Photoshopping that picture. It is much appreciated.

She is Like Michael Myers. She Will Not Die.

Thanks to an excellent catch by a vigilant reader, this Wall Street Journal article was brought to my attention. It's by some dude named Jeff Zaslow. He is completely unfamiliar to me. But, the article is about how the kids aren't alright. And, if you were writing a column from that retarded point of view, who would you ask for advice?

Oh God. Why won't she go away.

Yes, we have a Laura Sessions Stepp sighting! Huzzah!

So, this Zaslow column is about his daughter getting invited to homecoming by a boy. They dress up, buy flowers, do all the stupid high school shit, and then never go to the actual dance. They just hang out on their own. This is the end of civilization to Zaslow. Why, back in his day, dating meant something! You had to ask a girl on Wednesday for a Saturday date! There was none of this text messaging tomfoolery.

Honestly, reading this, you expect Zaslow to be upset that the children no longer wear onions on their belt (as was the style of his time).

And in case you're too lazy to click on the WSJ link and you think I'm being over-the-top:

Obviously, boys no longer have to call girls on Wednesday for a Saturday date. Now, college boys seeking weekend hookups send girls "U busy?" text messages at 2 or 3 a.m., and girls routinely rouse themselves and go, according to Ms. Stepp's research. Many girls spend the next day clutching their cellphones, waiting in vain for the boy to call.

These girls need to get a different hobby.

I am pissed that Zaslow didn't put the word "research" in scare quotes. Following, like, seven ludicrously wealthy women (and one token poor high school student being statutorily raped by a Metro bus driver) is not research. Those are anecdotes. Anecdotes from the coddled and immature. Anecdotes from daughters whose mothers don't let their children hang out with black kids (and this is presented as good parenting!) and who buy their daughters trips to the Bahamas when they've had a rough semester because that frat boy didn't call back.

Honestly, why is Laura Sessions Stepp considered an expert on the subject of teenage sexuality? A piece she edited won a Pulitzer. Fine. But that was a piece on textiles for Christ's sake. Since then she's been cruising on that stupid award and writing about something that she doesn't have any fucking experience in. Well, other than following around her small self-selected sample of desperate young adults who need men to justify their existence.

God damn it. If I had the time I would find eight happy well-adjusted high school and college students and follow them around for a few months. Then I would be outraged when I didn't get my book deal.

The column has some other gems. The conclusion is fantastic.

As the father of three daughters, I wish that more parents of sons would talk to their boys about being respectful, and about the thrill that can come from holding hands. Those of us with daughters need to tell them that empowerment is less about sexual freedom and more about recognizing their true feelings.

The "thrill that can come from holding hands"? Jesus Christ.

It is too bad that my daughter and her friends didn't demand that the boys take them to homecoming. Yes, they risked being dumped for easier girls. But maybe the boys would have gotten the message and, as promised, graciously escorted their dates to the dance.

I'm pretty far separated from days as a 16-year-old high school student. Well, I do remember not getting any. So if I had to choose between holding hands and the "easier girls," then, no, I wouldn't have gotten that message.

Another thing I remember about homecoming dances was that I never attended one. Not because I was trying to get into some girl's pants in a dark basement, but because, in the words of the reader who e-mailed me this article, homecoming is "a bullshit WASPy ritual of jocks, popularity, and getting laid in the car afterward, that requires a lot of money be spent on tickets, clothes, and dinner."

This is the tradition that "concerned parents" like Zaslow and LSS want to save? Hey, I get it that Zaslow's daughter was pissed that she was invited to homecoming and never went to the dance. That's a legitimate beef. But to equate that with the Great Hooking-Up Epidemic is beyond a stretch. Using LSS as intellectual backup is where the fabric starts to rip.

Of course, if Zaslow's daughter had too much to drink and got "gray raped" in this boy's basement, perhaps he wouldn't be so quick to call up Stepp for advice.

Let this be a warning to writers! If you use Laura Sessions Stepp as a way to advance some theory or observation you have, then your theory or observation is hopelessly wrong. And my readers will find you.

We Still Have LSS to Kick Around

After finally reading the writing on the wall, dead journalist walking Laura Sessions Stepp took the Washington Post's buyout offer. The long national nightmare was finally over.

Or was it?

A quick gander at today's Health section led me to a brand new Laura Sessions Stepp article. In typical LSS fashion, the story was about something that most alarmist news outlets had covered back in the 20th Century.

Freak dancing.

Oh for Pete's sake.

Stepp even admits to writing about freak dancing back when in 2001. So, why is it suddenly newsworthy? Because Dancing with the Stars is teaching young women (with preteen girls being specified) that there are different ways to dance sexy while still maintaining an air of mystery.

This is stupid. You know how it takes two to tango? Preteen girls can learn to tango all they want. They'll need a partner who needs to know how to dance as well. And I'm going to hypothesize that not too many preteen boys are that interested in learning how to tango or waltz.

The worst part is that Stepp is advocating physical education programs that teach "acceptably sexy" kinds of dancing (like swing). Swing dancing is acceptable. But teaching kids how to do the Electric Slide in step with "popular hip-hop songs" is not. The Electric Slide solves nothing. Isn't the point that kids want to dance with a specific partner and not a room full of people?

Actually, who cares what the point is. It's the Electric Fucking Slide. Why doesn't LSS go the whole nine yards and suggest the Macarena as a way for kids to rhythmically express themselves? No one should be doing The Electric Slide. Ever.

UMD and I Have Something in Common!

My hatred for the University of Maryland still runs strong. However, we both hate Duke University. So, congratulations to the Maryland basketball team for defeating Duke yesterday. Further congratulations to the student body for not rioting after beating a team that's now below .500 in conference play. The discretion was unexpected and appreciated.

To all my readers who don't really "get" sports, rooting for the Duke Blue Devils is like rooting for the New York Yankees. They always have the best talent and the best coaching, but the douchebagginess of their players and student body is second to none. Popped collars everywhere. Of course we all know that Duke's lacrosse team has been all over the papers for a rape that didn't happen and some crazy racism that did. Skinning bitches and thanking one's grandfather for their cotton t-shirts is certainly not a way to get good press.

This Duke hatred would appear kind of random, wouldn't it. Well, no. Big Head Rob reports that Why I Hate DC mascot Laura Sessions Stepp did a good deal of research for her new book Unhooked at Duke University. Great.

Again, for those who haven't been paying attention, Duke is an outlier when it comes to sexual deviancy. If someone told me LSS would be doing sex research at a major university, I would think to myself, "Please God don't let it be Duke." There's no better school to support your pre-made conclusions that today's college students and young adults are total sluts.

Even more annoying, the story has been done. Janet Reitman of Rolling Stone did an absolute hit job on the hook-up culture of Duke. Reitman's report focused more on post-feminism than on "the kids aren't alright" angle that you just know LSS is going to work with. Reitman falls into the same trappings as any stupid LSS article, but Reitman at least has the decency to not be so alarmist and condescending. If LSS talks to the same people as Reitman though...oh fuck.

From Reitman's article:

Sex at Duke is a sport most students participate in, on some level or another. Boys report that it's still a little tough to get a girl to get freaky -- anal sex, for example, is still rare enough that ''any Duke guy could look at a lineup of girls and point out the one who likes it,'' notes one male student (''usually the girl who's drunk and coked out of her gourd at a party at 4 a.m.,'' he adds). But traditional intercourse is common, and oral sex nearly ubiquitous, regarded as sort of a form of elaborate kissing that doesn't really mean very much. ''Everybody gives blow jobs now,'' says Naomi. ''Before,'' she adds -- meaning a pre-Monica/pre-Britney ''before'' -- ''it used to be you'd have sex and then give one.'' But now, girls give them freely -- on their own initiative, she says. (They also tend to get as much as they give, at least according to Duke men.)

You can feel Laura Sessions Stepp's head about to explode. I can't imagine what she would do if I told her the anecdotal (and unconfirmable) story I heard about a Duke girl penetrating herself with a champagne bottle in a bar to impress some guys. I assume it was the thin end. I didn't ask follow-up questions.

So, Laura Sessions Stepp and her college-aged narc friend Alicia (read Big Head Rob's post for details on this traitor) have gone for the easy kill. The Duke hook-up culture has been well documented over the past year. We all know how bad it is. Using Duke to support conclusions regarding the behavior of my peers is grossly unfair.

I really hate Laura Sessions Stepp.

Follow-up on My Previous Post

I'm feeling frisky today, so I thought I would continue my mockery of Laura Sessions Stepp. Stepp wrote that brilliant piece today on wingmen. Please scroll down a bit to see my long and hilarious take on her shoddy journalism.

Toby, a superior blogger and partner in crime, took the time to run Stepp through a Lexis-Nexis search. Here are her topics of choice:

MIDDLE SCHOOL ORAL SEX
July 8, 1999, A01, 2368 words:
"Parents Are Alarmed by an Unsettling New Fad in Middle Schools: OralSex"

FREAK DANCING
January 18, 2001, C4, 1882 words
"Just Freakin' the Night Away"

ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION (To be fair, I actually enjoyed this article.)
May 7, 2006, D01, 2383 words
"Cupid's Broken Arrow; Performance Anxiety and Substance Abuse Figure Into the Increase in Reports of Impotence on Campus"

HIGH SCHOOL ORAL SEX
September 16, 2005, A07, 785 words
"Oral Sex Prevalent Among Teens;Majority of Those 15-19 Engage in Practice, U.S. Study Finds"

So, it turns out Laura Sessions Stepp is the worst kind of journalist: The Alarmist. Also, she is really interested in oral sex.

UPDATE: A reader informs me that I missed:

MALE PROMISCUITY
6/28/04
"Fast and Loose; It's the 'Player' Who Gets The Girl (Or Girls), and a Rep That's Good and Bad."

COMEDY GOLD!

Most Asinine Article Ever

My favorite section of The Washington Post is the Style section. I know it's not hard news, but it's usually the only section I read cover to cover. So imagine my disappointment when today's Style section featured this gargantuan picture:

DUDE! COLLLLLEGE!

Oh my. Yes, The Washington Post, one of the premier newspapers the United States has to offer, has decided to devote a feature article on wingmen.

My first reaction was "Whaaa?" Sure, there was the Coors Light wingman commercial that everyone seemed to like. But didn't that come out, like, three years ago? Has there been a new development in wingman strategy? Why did the Post feel the need to devote precious copy space on this subject?

I was hoping that the article would be a sarcastic dismissal of college culture. It doesn't appear to be. It appears woefully serious. That being said, I think we can have some fun with this. The article is long, so I won't be copy and pasting the entire thing. Just some choice excerpts.

In the back of the club, on a bench built for two, a short college guy with a baby face is putting the moves on a miniskirted beauty whose shapely legs, crossed just so, rival Katie Couric's. The only thing between him and his destiny is her girlfriend, squished between the two of them, large lips in a pout...

And we're off! Solid opening paragraph. Katie Couric. Good work. Topical. Also, the girl with the pouty lips is later dismissed as someone who "wouldn't win any beauty contests." Good to know that we have a compassionate author on our hands.

...He's [the wingman's] like the fighter pilot flying beside and slightly behind the lead pilot in a hostile environment -- thus the term. You saw the prototype in the 1986 flick "Top Gun": Anthony Edwards's Goose (who was married!) to Tom Cruise's Maverick.

Moral of the story: wingmen are often killed when they eject themselves out of crashing fighter jets.

I also love the "(who was married!)" aside. All it does is show the limitations of the wingman metaphor. It's also amusing because it reads like Goose married Maverick, which would have been pretty sexy if you ask me.

"A mutual back-and-forth man love" is how Tony Moniello describes wingman camaraderie. Moniello, 22, and two buddies, Jay Jentz, 22, and Philipp Waclawiczek, 21, have been wingmanning for each other from the first week of freshman year at GW four years ago. They're sitting in Moniello's apartment, talking over plans for the party that night on U Street. Grey Goose, Southern Comfort and Everclear bottles line the bookshelves.

Jesus Christ, here we go. These three people are why girls would have to be retarded to go to places like Madhatter. Two of these three imbeciles are pictured on page C8 of the paper. You can almost smell their cologne and desperation.

Exams are over, graduation is approaching and each of them has several young women on his year-end wish list. (Some senior women, by the way, keep similar lists.) Once they start work in the real world, clubbing will become an occasional thing as opposed to a four-night-a-week addiction. They may actually have to ask women out on dates, take them to dinner. Wingman skills will still be needed, but not as often. Bummer.

God forbid you guys develop some maturity. Dating? Non-casual sex? Total bummer. And anyone who has a "clubbing addiction" deserves a debilitating stroke.

At college, a good wingman has been as important as a popped-collar shirt. This is a generation that, in large part, dismisses the idea of courtship. Many move fast through relationships: face-booking, instant-messaging, text-messaging...

Thank you, author (Laura Sessions Stepp), for describing my generation in such hilarious generalities. These are nothing but embarassing stereotypes. Not embarassing to me personally, but embarassing to the author for resorting to such bullshit.

I won't even address the popped collar simile. Suffice to say it makes me blind with rage.

...The wingman delivers the introduction, knowing that his job is to make his buddy look cool.

Good fucking luck.

"Hey, you only have a couple of minutes to make an impression," Moniello continues. "So if you have to save a baby seal from an oil spill in Alaska, you have to save a baby seal."

Jentz picks up: "Sometimes you're a lawyer. You may only have taken one law class, but what the heck? It adds flavor, gets people excited."...

"...The girl I'm after will say something like 'I hear he's a player' and he'll [the wingman'll] convince her I'm really in love with her."

No comment.

Well, one comment: This is sick. If I were the parent of one of these kids, I would hang myself. A parent's job is to give your child some sense of right and wrong. Some sense of decency. These parents failed. If I did this shit and it ended up in the Post, my mom would cry for days.

Jentz was Waclawiczek's wingman in just such a situation a few weeks ago. They were at a bar that was about to close. Waclawiczek decided to hit on a freshman and see if he could get her to go home with him. He did fine until it came to the going-home part, and then it became clear she wasn't leaving without her girlfriend. Jentz knew his role: Not only did he bring the girlfriend along, he also kept her occupied once they got to Waclawiczek's place. Both guys were happy at the end of the night.

Again, let me remind you, this is The Washington Fucking Post. How hook-up stories belong in this paper is beyond me.

Well done, guys. You lied your way into getting orgasms courtesy of naive freshmen. You deserve fucking medals.

...Lauren Faust, who is finishing up at GW this summer, agrees that on one level, women know when they're being scammed. "But in context it's harder to spot. I'm sure I've been wingmanned and not picked up on it. I can be completely self-absorbed."

DC college students are sometimes self-absorbed? Color me surprised! You don't have to be self-absorbed to fall for this shit; you merely have to be a total imbecile. Women who fall for lines about baby seals are the scum of the earth. These girls kind of deserve being nothing but a warm place for guys to come if they are impressed by Grey Goose, baby-seal rescue lies, and other such dastardly wingman tricks.

Ok, that's about it. The article ends, praise the Lord, with the boys going home empty-handed. This article left me with one unanswered question:

WHY THE HELL WAS THIS IN THE WASHINGTON FUCKING POST!?!?!?! THIS IS NOT NEWS! THESE ARE NOT CURRENT EVENTS! WHY DID YOU MAKE ME, A LOYAL READER, WASTE 10 MINUTES OF MY LIFE ON THREE GW MEATHEADS!?

Worst article ever. I truly believe that someone at the Post needs to get fired for this. All it accomplished was making college students look like lecherous assholes.

And who wants to bet that Lauren Sessions Stepp is a Post intern from GW who considers this her big break? Well, it's not. It's a journalism abortion. Fuck you, Lauren Sessions Stepp. I hope you drop off the face of the Earth.

UPDATE: It turns out the author is middle-aged. Lauren Sessions Stepp is not an inexperienced writer. Just a condescending one.

EMERGENCY BLOG POST!

I hate Friday evening posts. No one ever reads them. But this is important.

LAURA SESSIONS STEPP WILL BE SPEAKING ABOUT COLLEGE RELATIONSHIPS ON TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13th AT THE ETHICS AND PUBLIC POLICY CENTER. THE EPPC IS LOCATED HERE:


View Larger Map

Here's the dilly:

Many college campuses across the country report rising numbers of sexual assaults, date rapes, and sexually-transmitted infections. And there is reason to believe the "hook up" culture -- the prevalence of sexual activity with "no strings attached" -- is affecting students’ mental health.

Are students today well-educated about healthy relationships? Are college administrators taking the right approach to reducing health risks? On November 13, five experts will come together to discuss the state of affairs on campus -- and some modest proposals.

Laura Sessions Stepp is a Washington Post writer and author of Unhooked (2007). Dr. Miriam Grossman is a campus psychiatrist at UCLA and author of Unprotected (2006). Wendy Shalit is author of A Return to Modesty (1999) and Girls Gone Mild (2007). Cassandra DeBenedetto is a recent graduate of Princeton University and founder of Princeton's Anscombe Society. Dawn Eden is director of the Cardinal Newman Society's Love and Responsibility Program and author of The Thrill of the Chaste (2007).

Oh man. This looks amazing. And they're serving wine and cheese. Of course, I, with considerable help, confronted Stepp only two weeks ago. Surely she remembers my handsome mug. So, people, I need your help.

REGISTRATION: You must register to attend this event.
E-mail: send your name and affiliation to mrybak@eppc.org.
Fax: your name and affiliation to (202) 408-0632, with attention to Mary Rose Rybak.

What should I choose as my affiliation?

What should you choose as your affilation?

Seriously, this shit is B-A-N-A-N-A-S. Five pro-chastity women gathering around and offering "modest proposals" on how women should stop being such sluts. (Oh please God let LSS suggest baking cookies.) And they're going to be airing this drivel on C-SPAN. So, let's crash this motherfucker and give the nice people over at C-SPAN a show.

Rambling Laura Sessions Stepp Wrap-Up

So, the LSS I-95 Corridor Bonanza was last night. The NYC wrap-up comes courtesy of my new favorite (non-sports related) blog, Jezebel. Seriously, Jezebel is fantastic and I can't recommend it highly enough.

Last night my lady friend, Terri, and I took the Orange Line to Arlington Central Library. The gist of this event was a bunch of 20 and 30-somethings would stop by the library, check out all these charities that had set up little displays, and then listen to LSS talk about the importance of mentoring.

In other words, it would have been grossly inappropriate to ask questions about gray rape ("grape") and it was grossly inappropriate to go after her stupid book unless she mentioned it in her speech.

Well, of course she mentioned it in her speech. Of. Course. She. Did. Her speech about mentoring was like a 30-minute infomercial for Unhooked.

One of the things she said stood out though. She argued that true feminism was about choice. That the feminists of "her time" were interested in choosing to abort and/or choosing to have kids. Choosing to work outside the home or choosing to be a homemaker. Equal doesn't mean the same. And, man, I 100% agreed. Choosing to be a homemaker is just as feminist a thing to do as choosing to work 40+ hours a week while getting the equal pay women deserve. As long as the choice is there.

But that's not the book LSS wrote. She wasn't writing about how women should not be choosing to get laid. (And let's be honest, a lot of people like getting laid.) She was writing about women being the sexual gatekeepers instead of choosing to pursue. She was writing about women baking cookies to impress men. She was writing nonsense like "women should avoid bars, that's a man's place." LSS had left an opening and we were there to expose it.

After some friendly questions, Terri went up to the plate. She brought up the baked goods line and then added something LSS told the New York Times:

The quaint joy of being wooed is not among the most griped-about elements of “Unhooked.” That distinction belongs to this paragraph: “Tying one on can be fun occasionally. Just don’t let it take over your social life. Organize weekend getaways and other events to bring people together. Bake cookies, brownies, muffins. Ask your girlfriends for assistance. Guys will do anything for homemade baked goods.”

Ms. Sessions Stepp said she anticipated fallout from those lines, but was simply pointing out there are other things to do for fun.

“I said to my editor, ‘Should I use that line?’ ” Ms. Sessions Stepp said. “He said, ‘Well, it’s going to get some people mad, but you know what? That’s good. We like controversy.’ So I said, ‘Well, O.K., just so they don’t ignore my book.’ ”

So, that retarded line was kept in to generate controversy and sell some books. LSS is like some cross of Ann Coulter and Dana Carvey's Church Lady.

So Terri asked her how someone could mentor a young girl into conforming into typical gender roles and still call herself a feminist. LSS responded with something that directly contradicts the New York Times article by saying that she could have used any other example of an activity as long as the point was made that women don't belong in bars.

It was at this point that she lost the room.

I quickly raised my hand and asked how she could say "feminism is about choice" out of one side of her mouth while saying "ladies don't belong in stereotypically male environments" out the other. Her response that people, gentlemen and ladies, are only at bars to get blitzed and hook-up with some dude or lady was not well-received.

The next question was from someone asking what the problem with bars is. Isn't the dude you meet at a bar the same dude you meet at Gold's Gym or the library? Why does going to a bar make someone undateable?

And then the master of ceremonies cut the Q+A short. Victory!

But not before telling the crowd that some of the charity representatives were going to Carpool, a fucking bar!, after the event was over. After he made that comment everyone laughed and the MC blushed. He realized his error.

Terri and I left the event with people thanking us for our hostility.

My first confrontation with LSS was, alas, only a draw. (Warning: post made before declaring all-out war on LSS.) This second confrontation could only be interpreted as pure, unadulterated victory. We fucking got her. It's a nice feeling.

(This morning I realized a far better question, considering the venue, would have been if she mentored a 15-year-old girl in her book who was getting statutory raped left and right [including by an in-uniform Metro bus driver, ugh] to report these rapes to the police. That's what any mentor would do, right? I'm genuinely curious to see if she did the same.)

Party Crash!

I love when my readers forward me this stuff:

Dear xxxxxxxxx,

The Arlington County Volunteer Office is sending this email to all volunteers registered in our Online Volunteer Connection. We are excited to announce an exciting event next week…

CRM Mentoring Fair Featuring Laura Sessions Stepp
Learn more & get involved with groups that mentor young adults in Arlington… Hear from a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist who specializes in teenager and young adult issues…

Community Role Models (CRM) is partnering with Arlington Public Libraries to host an exciting community event where you can learn about Arlington area mentoring organizations and hear from Laura Sessions Stepp, the nationally acclaimed author of Our Last Best Shot and Unhooked. Come to the CRM Mentoring Fair featuring Laura Sessions Stepp on Monday, October 15 at 7:00 PM in the Arlington Central Library Auditorium. Light refreshments will be provided and all are welcome! RSVP Here

We hope to see you next week – and please feel free to forward this email along to others who might be interested.

Best Wishes,

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Arlington County Volunteer Office

It just so happens that I am very interested. Remember when I courageously called LSS a "cunt" using the magick of the Internet? Maybe now I can do it to her face! And it's Metro accessible too!


And if any of my lady readers attend, I recommend wearing something slutty. Her head would explode.

Still Not Letting It Go

The New York Times has printed a positive review of the book. Well, it's more of a puff piece than a review. Obviously, I was quite excited to read this quote from Mrs. Stepp:

Ms. Sessions Stepp said that she welcomes criticism, though not from people who have not read the book or who have never conducted research.

"This is what I love about the bloggers," she said. "They haven't been out there interviewing young people for 10 years. They're talking about their own college experience. Everyone's had some sort of sexual experience and they all think they're experts on it."

The bloggers? That's me! I mean, I spend more time on LSS then anyone else (usually to the detriment of this blog), so, hurray for being noticed! I don't know of anyone else that she could possibly be referring to. That's right, a Pulitzer Prize winner is on my case. I've finally made it big!

Since I can now assume that LSS is reading this, I should point out that I have done "research." I can arbitrarily pick nine girls from different universities (not just Duke and George Washington like you so lazily did) and use their sexual adventures as a definitive thesis on how my generation treats sex. If you can use an unscientific self-selected sample then so can I. To be fair, my sample includes women who just want to hook up. But, hey, look at that. It also includes women who aren't interested in hooking up at all. Some are looking for "Mr. Right." Others have already found a match since they're in super serious relationships. Just because you found nine girls who give out blowjobs after last call doesn't mean that they are representative of my high school and college students.

Yes, I am talking about my own college experience (and the experience of high school friends). My own college experience has had hook-ups, long-term significant others, and dizzying dry spells. So what? Despite what you claim, Mrs. Stepp, I don't think I'm an expert on it. I just don't think you're an expert on it either.

Unhooked, if you can't tell, is driving me up the wall. I should totally be done with it by now but I had to take a break because it was making me feel both stupid and angry. I'm currently reading A Brief History in Time again in a futile attempt to regenerate brain cells. Um, and I also lost my autographed copy of the book. That's what's really getting in the way of publishing my top-10 LSS quotes. Don't worry, I'll find it. It's in my house somewhere.

WhyIHateDC Christmas

***UPDATE BELOW***

February 15, 2007 is the release date for Laura Sessions Stepp's new book Unhooked.

In her second book, journalist Stepp (Our Last Best Shot) gets an inside perspective on the "hookup," which has become the "primary currency of social interaction" between the sexes in high schools and colleges...Inspired by a series of articles she wrote on eighth-grade oral sex rings for The Washington Post in 1998 ("two years before the popularity of oral sex in middle schools percolated through the media"), Stepp avoids breathless sensationalism, preferring instead to explore the meaning of "hooking up," its fallout, potential long-range consequences for women and men, and the factors that have allowed such a shift to take place-wisely asking, "Where are young women's teachers?" rather than "What is wrong with these girls?"

Oh dear Christ. And, yes, I pre-ordered it. How can this not be worth the $16? I am going to absolutely devour this text as quickly as possible to make sure the most hilarious excerpts end up on this blog by around February 19th.

Special hat tip to the anonymous commenter who led me to this Mediabistro link.

UPDATE: Oh thank my lucky stars. She'll be speaking at Politics and Prose on February 21. That's a short walk from my house. Please leave suggestions for what I should ask her in the comments.

A Truly Glorious Day for the Style Section

You may have noticed this in the comments of my last post, but today's Post features not one, but two articles by the official Why I Hate DC mascot, Laura Sessions Stepp. The first deals with the lack of tourists visiting the Treasury Department. Boring and lame. I'm only interested in what the Honorable El Ess Ess has to say about today's youth.

Bingo!

Sessions Stepp has decided to emulate the best scribe the Style section has to offer, Lisa de Moraes, and write about television. LSS won't just write about any program though. Oh, no. She wants to write about a PBS documentary about....wait for it....Generation Next!

Here's Stepp's stupid opening paragraph:

They've been called many things by the experts who study them: Generation Y and Generation Why?, Echo Boomers and Millennials, the Google or MyPod Generation (the latter a combination of MySpace and iPod.) Their test scores have been analyzed, sex lives examined and shopping habits catered to -- probably more than any other generation's.

That emphasis is mine. Geez, Laura. I would agree that my generation has been totally overanalyzed. I wonder where the fault lies? Oh. Here we go.

Laura, for the love of God, please leave the 16-25-year-old demographic alone. Please. Please stop telling old people that we break-up with each other over text message. Please stop making references to "freak dancing." And, please, for the love of all that is holy, please refrain from referring to me as a "Nexter." That is a seriously stupid word that you've coined.

(The worst part of this is that, no matter what, I am buying her book the day it comes out. I am feeding the monster.)

This is How Far Off the Rails She Is

Ok, the great Laura Sessions Stepp blow out tomorrow is at capacity. I did not get in. Well, I didn't try since I had dinner plans. But, hopefully, someone who visits this site got a pass. I mean, there were only, like, 30 people at her last appearance at the Arlington Library and 60 people at her book singing at Politics and Prose. Both times I ran into a reader. So, one of you got in, right? Please?

At the very least I plan on DVRing the shit out of this.

I'm really posting to bring more attention to a comment I received from EJ Takes Life:

Did you happen to catch who was co-sponsoring this "discussion?" The Cardinal Newman Society (Catholic college society sponsoring "a program to re-establish chastity as the cornerstone of Catholic campus culture") and the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute, a charming organization whose homepage is currently extolling the virtues of Phyllis Schlafly, "the first to defeat the radical feminists."

How exactly does LSS, who is supposed to be a journalist with at least some modicum of impartiality, justify headlining an event that blatantly trumpets a religiously and socially conservative agenda? Especially because she is identified in promotional materials first as "Washington Post reporter" and not as the author of retro modesty lit.

The Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute's website is appropriately fantastic. Is that Ann Coulter on the homepage? Good Lord, it is. This is the kind of organization that comes out with columns titled "Want Protection from Breast Cancer? Have Some Babies." If I had seen that without any context I would have assumed it was an Onion headline.

Terri, my lady friend who accompanied me on my last LSS party crash, also wanted me to highlight this from the description of the discussion tomorrow night:

Many college campuses across the country report rising numbers of sexual assaults, date rapes, and sexually-transmitted infections. And there is reason to believe the "hook up" culture - the prevalence of sexual activity with "no strings attached" - is affecting students' mental health. Are students today well-educated about healthy relationships?

That's right, college ladies. Since you keep getting rapes and assaulted, maybe you should try to educate yourself about healthy relationships.

I know sound like a skipping record every time I start talking about Laura Sessions Stepp, but I just can't help myself. This woman, with her dangerously old timey ideals and her complete lack of journalistic integrity, always claims to be a feminist. Again, please click on the Clare Booth Lucy website. What kind of feminist would support them?

Little Known Fact: Soccer Cures AIDS

SMALL UPDATE BELOW

So the Health section of today’s Post features a huge photo of an under-16 girls soccer team. I did not need to read the byline to figure out who wrote the accompanying article.

Hot off the discovery that teenage girls like to shop more than teenage boys, LSS’s next project is to document this soccer team’s trip to South Africa. The girls plan to teach the locals the joys of the sport. Somehow this is supposed to prevent people from contracting the HIV. I don’t really get it.

I am all for charity. Even charity which is obviously designed to broaden the soccer team’s horizons instead of actually, you know, really helping anyone. I mean, it would be nice if they wanted to help the poorer parts of DC and Maryland. I’ve been tipped off that they have their own HIV and poverty problems. But, South Africa instead. Fine. Godspeed.

This trip will be good for the Americans and hopefully it will be good for the South Africans. The latter are getting at least a $10,000 donation out of it. My beef with this, and this is should be obvious to anyone who’s been reading this site for an extended period of time, is that Laura Sessions Stepp is a terrible writer.

What happens when they [the soccer team] sit around a fire and talk about self-image and sexuality with girls more open to those conversations than they are? Or when they have to forgo such everyday luxuries as Life cereal, artichokes and dark chocolate for yams, rice and beans?

First and foremost, wasn’t your whole entire thing with Unhooked? That American girls are now way more open about discussing their sexuality? Don’t you remember writing that? Tell me you at least remember your book tour? You made being a 16-year-old girl look like one big uninterrupted blowjob. You learned the terms "tebagging" and, ugh, "eating a roast beef sandwich" from 16-year-old girls. Now they're the shy ones!? Your inconsistencies are as frustrating as your prose, Ms. Stepp.

And how in God’s green Earth did you come up with “Life cereal, artichokes and dark chocolate”? What a weird and distracting sentence. (Editor's Note: Life cereal is really fucking good but why is it more expensive per ounce than other cereals? What fancy ingredient jacks up the price?)

The piece then devolves into a summary of all the wacky sitcom-style culture clashes that the author expects. No cell phones or iPods? Crazy! Baboons? Whoa! How will these girls ever manage!? Oh, that’s right. They’ll mange through the power of soccer.

"I hope we can leave behind the knowledge of how empowering soccer can be," said Joanna Meyer-Glitzenstein, 16, a tough center/midfielder, and one of several girls interviewed in their homes before leaving.

This is especially hilarious because, as the article notes, girls in South Africa don’t even play soccer. That’s a boy sport over there. It’s not like the South African girls don’t know what soccer is. And empowering? My experience with soccer was anything but empowering. It was a constant reminder of my athletic inferiority and general lack of grace.

So, a bunch of wealthy (certainly on a global scale, but probably on a national scale too) girls are going to South Africa to teach poorer girls how to play soccer. The irony of Americans teaching soccer to Africans is duly noted. Somewhere in all of this, everyone learns about HIV. I still don’t get that part, but, whatever. It’s win-win. The only losers are the readers of The Washington Post. We’re going to have deal with LSS waxing poetic on this for the next two weeks. Let's be honest, none of us could really give two shits. That hasn't stopped her before and it won't stop her now. Fantastic.

UPDATE: I didn't notice this at first, but this series is being called "World's United." Let's just say that I'm very wary of that apostrophe. There is no way LSS and/or whatever editor titled this meant "World is United." They mean two worlds. Plural. No apostrophe. It's the fucking title of this two week project and they can't even get that right.

UPDATE #2: OK. Only one link says "World's." The rest say "Worlds." It's one error too many, but Lord knows I've made enough mistakes around these parts to let it slide.

Douchebag Follow-Up

So, a nice fellow e-mailed me an article from something called Gelf Magazine. It's an interview with Anthony Moniello. You remember Anthony, don't you? Anthony was one of the characters in the great wingman article that the Post published in May, 2006. This was the article that started my long and fruitful love affair with Laura Sessions Stepp. I am saddened to see that LSS didn't disclose that Moniello was a student of hers at George Washington. I didn't learn much in college, but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night ace Journalism and Ethics. Tsk tsk, Mrs. Stepp. If I know better, then a Pulitzer Prize winning "journalist" should certainly know better.

As for the interview, it's freaking hilarious. Moniello is, to put it concisely, a dumb prick. See:

The Yankees hat and the necklace are nice touches. I hope he lies his way in to sleeping with someone with the clap. His pee deserves to burn.

I would link to my take on the original wingman article, but my archives are down. Coincidentally, I notice that I've been switched over to "New" Blogger. I doubt this is a coincidence.

UPDATE: Here we go!

LSS WaPo Chat

I know, I know. It's been nothing but Laura Sessions Stepp and Late Night Shots 'round these parts. It beats me complaining about the Metro, right?

(Of course, the Metro remains fucked. How was everyone's commute this morning? Wasn't that great when there were no trains headed towards Silver Spring for 20 minutes due to some problem at Woodley Park? Or when the trains would come every seven minutes and they would inevitably already be full? Fuck Metro.)

So, Laura Sessions Stepp. She has a WaPo live chat starting in about ten minutes. Please feel free to submit a question.

In case you don't want to spend the next hour or so being called a dirty little slut, here's the review of her book Unhooked which is coming out tomorrow. It's a deliriously negative review and it makes me smile.

Here's an excerpt from the book that made me smile, then giggle, then chuckle, then guffaw:

"In a smorgasbord of booty, all the hot dishes start looking like they've been on the warming table too long."

*Speechless*

You People Have Let Me Down

I was a bit busy yesterday. You may have noticed I didn't post anything. Heck, I didn't even read The Washington Post! Saved myself 35 cents! Did any of you read yesterday's Post? I bet some of you did. And if you're one of those people, shame on you.

From now on, when you notice the words "Laura," "Sessions," and "Stepp" in a byline, please notify me immediately. E-mail me. Send smoke signals. I don't care how, but make sure I know about it. This is especially germane when we're dealing with an article that tries to explain to adults why college students find drinking more exciting than homework. Seriously, that was the theme of her last piece in the Post. Wrap your skull around that. How old do you have to be to find this surprising? My 83-year-old grandfather still talks about his college fraternity hijinx. What does that make Stepp? 107?

That is a fierce powersuit.

I would spend another 1,000 words or so making fun of LSS, but the story is a day old and DCist already did a lot of the leg work. Wonkette already stole Late Night Shots from me. Don't let DCist take my precious.

Come on, gang. Let's not have this happen again.

Marion Barry to Give Away Turkey, Crack

It's turkey time and Councilmember Marion Barry (D-Ward 8) is planning to give away 1,200 birds starting at 9 a.m today, so sayeth the Washington Post.

Apparently he does this every Thanksgiving. The article isn’t clear if he’s giving away live "birds," which if he were, would be pretty hilarious to watch.

But you’ve got to HURRY if you want one! This event started an hour ago. You don’t want to miss out on all that free turkey… and crack. Do you?

As tradition, the Mayor did the same thing earlier in the month, but still. This is Marion Barry we’re talking about. We’re watching closely because only he could fuck this up in classic Barry way.

Here's the kicker. Barry made a statement and it goes like this. Washington Post.com:

But Barry has words for any jaded souls out there.

"I think it is truly tragic when so many people are unable to afford a meal at thanksgiving due to the massive loss of jobs and the impact of a slow economy," Barry said in a statement announcing his program. "America is focused so much on Wall Street and Main Street, but nobody is focused on the side or the back street where poverty is prevalent. We as a society of people just don't care enough and that cycle must change."

Oh fuck you, Barry. “We” (read: white people) "just don’t care enough” about the poverty, the government inefficiency and the political cronyism in this city that you've helped to create and perpetuate? I’ve got news for you. The city government hasn’t cared in decades. Jaded are those kids stabbing each other in Anacostia High. Jaded are the children in the city turning to prostitution just to feed themselves. (Side note: Will someone please page Laura Sessions Stepp about this? I want her 1950’s utopian-centric head to explode.)

And lest we forget, Barry has been the lead proponent in erecting the new Nationals Stadium EPIC FAIL. Evidently his answer to helping poor people is to spend millions of taxpayer dollars to price them out of the ghetto and then give them a turkey as a parting gift. And, finally, Barry has been one of the chief assholes blocking Michelle Rhee’s educational reforms, arguably the last best hope for the District’s public school system. A wise man once said, you can give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. But teach a man how to fish and he can eat forever.

Well, you can give away a million turkey’s Barry, but you’re still a dick. Just sayin'.

Feelin' Massachusetts

I walk around
This little town.
I spit on the ground
And wait for the sky to fall down.
Show me the way to the door.
Show me out 'cause I'm
So, so, so, so, so, so, so, so bored

So the next stop is Ohio then. Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. And probably updating here once or twice a month. Hope you like Lifetime movies as much as I do.

Even though I'm about to be replaced, it would be remiss of me if I didn't link to this article about Nationals Stadium. It's really a stunner. I insist you read the entire thing and let it wash over you.

When DCist reported that I was leaving, some dude in the comments chastised me about being consistently wrong about the stadium deal. That's when it occurred to me that the stadium deal proponents were no brighter than the people so eager to invade Iraq in 2003. All the evidence and events wouldn't supercede their wanting to be right. Any moron could see that such an invasion would be disasterous. And yet sub-morons (including my parents, hi Mom and Dad!, and my last two preferred presidential candidates) convinced themselves that this was the right thing to do. Now we have damage that can't be undone.

With the stadium, we were giving away an unprecedented amount of money for an unproven product. This is retarded. Anyone with a brain should have seen the potential for this to go badly. But no. These mongoloids just plug up their ears, close their eyes, and wait for the problems to go away.

My priorities are so damaged that I'll vote for a legislator who supported the invasion (Kerry and Clinton) but I have never and will never vote for or support anyone who crammed the stadium legislation down our throats.

So, stadium proponents/sub-morons, I double-fucking-dare you to read that article and not come away with the conclusion that the stadium deal was an unprecedented disaster.

The worst part, there are going to be people crawling out of the woodwork to make that case. Just like the true believers who think we found WMD in Iraq and that the surge has worked. Well, I'm done with you. You are wrong. You will always be wrong. And if it ever comes up for discussion when I'm visiting DC or something, I am going to lord it over you. I have no time for your stupidity.

If I have a legacy, which I won't because I'm a blogger, I hope it's that people think of me when even the most stubborn among us admit that the stadium deal was a colossal failure.

Late Night Shots, Laura Sessions Stepp, the Metro. All are peanuts to me compared to the stadium deal. So that the WaPo article would come out on my last day is like a gift from the angels.

Alright, the replacement blogger should be starting next week. She'll be using a different e-mail address since the old one (whyihatedc at gmail dot com) is attached to some fantasy sports trophies that I don't want to have disappear.

Thanks for reading my poorly thought out posts for the past two plus years. I really enjoyed my time here. xoxo

Ding Dong the Witch is Dead!

Which old witch? The gray rape witch!

That's right folks, months after being moved from the Style section to the slums of the Health section, Laura Sessions Stepp has finally taken the hint and has accepted the Post's buyout offer. She gets to enjoy an early retirement.

There's only one way to celebrate the good news. Rainbow party! My place tonight at 8pm. You're all invited! Punch will be served.