Jezebel 
Enter your username and password.
New York, 8:34 PM
Mon Nov 23
65 posts in the last 24 hours
Tip your editors:
tips@jezebel.com
Editor-in-Chief:
Anna Holmes
Email | Twitter
Deputy Editor:
Dodai Stewart
Email | Twitter
Senior Contributing Editor:
Tracie Egan
Email | Twitter
Contributing Editors:
Anna North
Email | Twitter
Sadie Stein
Email | Twitter
Reporter:
Irin Carmon
Email
Editorial Assistant:
Margaret Hartmann
Email | Twitter
Contributors:
Jenna Sauers
Email
Rich Juzwiak
Email | Twitter
Lizzie Skurnick
Email
Interns:
Katy Kelleher
Twitter
Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
11/04/09
Why would anyone have a problem with a private art collector who actually shares his collection with the public? If he hangs his work on the walls of his house, the public will never get to see it. Additionally, his house is probably not light and climate controlled, which could present preservation issues. And since some of the monthly operating costs of the museum no doubt go towards paying professionals to curate and care for the collection, he'd have to spend a good portion of that money no matter where the works are hung.
I'm all for righteous indignation about the wasteful lifestyles of the rich, but I don't think collecting and showing art should be included. Patronage is a necessary component of the art world and the fact that he's enabling the public to see his collection on a regular basis is a step up from the average private collector.
And there are two problems with the "just go to the Met" throwaway line:
1) I can't see the works owned by this guy at the Met because they're not there. Implying that all art is basically the same- that looking at one painting is just as good as looking at another- is a bit ignorant. A parallel: reading Lolita is not the same as reading Bend Sinister, and I don't think anyone would suggest that it is.
2) I love the Met's "give what you can" door policy but I strongly urge everyone to give more than $.50 if you possibly can. Museums fund a lot more than the average person sees; research, preservation, and education are expensive and not very sexy missions. The trend for blockbuster shows that bring in the dollars isn't about profit, it's about funding those missions that no one is interested in funding. If we all gave more, we'd see a lot more programming that isn't Impressionists.
I know I took this too seriously and I'm a humorless jerk, but I just get so tired of visual art being used as an example of wasteful spending. #stephanieseymour
11/04/09
Cos when I win the lottery, I'm buying one in every colour, to match each of my houses, on Makebelieve Island. #stephanieseymour
11/04/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
As for me, if I were blessed with that much money (which I am not because in my family we are not given money, we earn it)...I cannot fathom spending $50,000 a year on clothing, much less a month. #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
"Oh, no. You don't understand this is an Alaia."
"An a-what-a?"
"It's like a totally important designer."
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
$270,000/month buys 900 hours of escort time... or in other words... more time than there is in a month... since there isn't more than 744 hours in any given month.
Now if he manages to only pay support for 5 years (but most likely it'll be for way longer), each year of marriage will have cost him $1 million... which works out to about 70 hours of Escort time at $300/hour.
That's the *minimum* the marriage to this woman is costing him.
Now Stephanie Seymour is good looking... but not THAT good looking.
And don't give me this line that it's "child support"... I support my 2 kids, myself, my wife, my car and my house on less than 2% of that $270,000/month.
Not more than 2% of that money is for the "needs" of the kids.
So... It's financially more logical to see Escorts than get married... and the more money a man has, the more logical it gets.
Especially factoring in that there doesn't seem to be any time limit for the support payments.
So the moral of this story is... Financially, marriage is an insanely stupid thing for any man to agree to if you live in the UK, Canada or the USA. #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
11/03/09
But yes, if you see a wife as the same thing as a whore (which in the cases of trophy wives, I'd have to agree), a whore makes much more financial sense. Especially considering you don't have to pay a whore once you stop seeing her.
Unless you get her pregnant. #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
11/03/09
And how often does that happen to women compared to men, eh? #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
Which is why the suicide rate for divorced men is 4 times higher than women, right?
No... what you're repeating is misandrist disinformation.
Divorce these days leaves both women AND men worse off.
Men are worse off due to insane court judgements... and they lose access to their kids a good part of the time.
Women are worse off because they often *choose* to stop working because "he earns more than enough"... so as a result, she drops out of the work force and screws herself career-wise if the marriage goes south. But at least they have the kids most of the time... and don't talk that that's such a "bad burden"... if it such a hard thing, then they should offer full custody to the man.
As a father who has done it all... including changing Atomic diaper, parenting is not the huge, difficult and awful burden some make it out to be... unless the child is disabled or autistic or something.
And even if you get the Escort pregnant, I bet it'll still be cheaper than what this guy had to pay.
And one other thing... this whole thing where the courts just blindly apply the "18% of income" rule is dumb and detached from reality.
11/03/09
*sigh* might be time to find some new friends. #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
11/03/09
Let's say her day rate were her old modeling rate of $10,000 per day. Give or take.
With 365 days per year, her time is worth $3.65 MM per year. And he has had exclusive rights to her time and genetic material over the past 16-odd years. One would think there should be some premium for that.
Yet he's only paying $3.24 MM per year in alimony, probably for something less than 16 years. So, as best I can tell, he's getting her at a 10% discount, minimum! #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
Marriage is risky for the high income earner in a marriage, regarless of gender. (In my marriage it's me.)
Not so risky if you both have equal-ish incomes and continue to work, or if the majority of your income is from assets that pre-date the marriage.
Almost all risk can be taken care of with a pre-nup, at least in the US. (Not so much in the UK, not sure about Canada.) #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
Escorts as wife replacements only make "financial sense" for the super rich.
Most men would go broke pretty quick. Including you.
And you keep saying how man are torn from their kids upon divorce. I actually can have sympathy for that. But I have much less sympathy when you argue in favor of escorts since they probably won't give a man any kids.
I do agree with you that men and women generally do suffer post divorce. #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
If the thought of giving your spouse of 16 years half the amount of money you spend on polo ponies is that appalling, then don't get married. I know this might be a really hard concept for someone who is probably quite full of himself, but you aren't actually doing anyone a favor by marrying her.
[www.bio-medicine.org]
[current.com]
[www.telegraph.co.uk]
And you know you have to pay child support for babies you have with escorts too, right? Not just wife-babies.
Marriage has been shown to be beneficial to mens' health and longevity:
[www.rand.org]
[www.dailymail.co.uk]
11/03/09
11/03/09
You liken children to a punishment. People don't fight for custody because taking care of kids is easy and fun, they do it because they want to raise their children. It's a shame that men aren't treated fairly by the courts in some cases, but that's some cases.
And you continue to liken wives to escorts. A marriage is not a service. You aren't paying alimony because she had sex with you during your marriage, or kept you company.
A marriage is a partnership. As with other disolutions of partnerships, when one person wants to leave they have to buy the other out, or settle with them, and that involves settlements like alimony, child support, and custody. and it doesn't really matter which partner wants to leave. It's a crude analogy but it's much more apt than this whole escort comparison. #stephanieseymour
11/04/09
I said "the US does not punish premarital sex as adultery" (or "fornication," often found in the same statute, with similar punishment schemes as "adultery"). I did NOT say that it was never on the books, or even that it isn't currently on the books.
It's pretty obvious no states are currently enforcing any prohibition against premarital sex, even though South Carolina could. I found this regarding the South Carolina statute: "a statute enacted many years ago makes it a crime for unmarried people to engage in sexual intercourse, although there is very little chance in modern times that anyone could successfully be prosecuted for fornication."
2001 South Carolina CLE on
"Marriage and Divorce Law"
[books.google.com]
I can't find any recent SC cases that actually have prosecuted anyone for fornication, so, luckily for our friend Peter, it seems he can fornicate to his little heart's content. It certainly doesn't seem like fear of punishment or prosecution for having pre-marital sex is forcing Peter into a loveless marriage that will rip his pocketbook to shreds.
And I am sure all of the fornicators on Jezebel are breathing a HUGE sigh of relief right now.
11/04/09
11/04/09
Well I'm basing my numbers on what's actually available via Craigslist... go see for yourself in the "erotic services" section.
So that's how I know your "$10,000 per day" figure is Crack Pipe territory.
Even if you build a relationship with the Escort in question and do more than just sex, you still won't be spending even half of that... Not even a Quarter of that.
Ms Seymour isn't worth $10,000/day... unless she's actually *earning* it.
And speaking of Stephanie Seymour's rates and earning things... what is stopping her from being an "Independent Woman" who can "do anything a man can do" and earn some money herself?
What happened to all the money she earned as a Victoria Secret model?
What irks me about this is that people talk about "the needs of the children"... but awards like this have nothing to do with "needs". It's pure entitlement, greed and misandry... "what's mine is mine AND what's yours is mine too" #stephanieseymour
11/04/09
11/04/09
Nope... even makes sense for the middle class too when you factor in all the costs of divorce... including legal fees, court fees, income lost due to having to show up in court, stress, emotional costs, etc.
The difference with an escort is that if you run low on cash, you can stop the spending by simply reducing the frequency of visits. And if you are dissatisfied with one, you can easily switch to another.
Can't do that in a marriage.
Now to everybody else that feels threatened or offended by my words...
Believe it or not, I'm speaking as someone who actually DOESN'T visit escorts... but I know people who do.
I'm a male who did the "get married, have kids" thing... and now I'm separated... but I still live with my kids.
My situation isn't typical.
You see... I wish things weren't this way... but the *truth* is that they are.
When you see guys being highly reluctant or outright opposed to marriage, you really shouldn't be surprised.
I know I'm never going to get married ever again. And it's not because I've met "the love of my life"
I *thought* I met the love of my life... until she left last year with the kids...
And let me tell you... having someone take off with your kids and not knowing where the kids are is pure HELL. Though she did come back after a short period... but the relationship is still over.
I look back at my own decision to get married (and we were together for almost 15 years) and it's hard for me to say that it wasn't a mistake... only I don't regret having kids.
When I was 19, I had a 42 year old woman offer to pay me to be her 'kept man'... and now I wonder now how my life would have turned out if I took the "manwhore" route in life.
So while you all think I'm some person who sees escorts regularly, that's actually not the truth at all.
I have loved... and I've also had it completely crushed.
As for people having sympathy for men being blocked from seeing the kids... in the past 5-10 years, there have been reforms to fix that... particularly in Australia where shared custody is Assumed. #stephanieseymour
11/04/09
That's not what I'm saying... I'm saying that I've often heard *women* who have custody of kids talk like having custody of their kids is such a "big burden" and "punishment"
I've seen/heard that many times.
And it's to people like that where I say "If it's such a big burden and your 'suffering' is so great, then hand over custody of the kids to your Ex"... but of course when you say that, they totally change their tune... which reveals that all the talk about kids being a "big burden" by custodial parents is BS.
THAT's the point I'm making. #stephanieseymour
11/04/09
Unfortunately, *nothing* will protect you from those, short of a vasectomy, as child support awards aren't limited to married couples.
(Edit: but they *can* protect you from insane alimony awards. )
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/03/09
I wanted to feel bad for Stephanie but knew that they deserved to use each other as much as possible.
So now she reaches a point where she realizes she wa merely a baby machine and now wants out.
They are both disgusting.
11/03/09
11/03/09
He supposedly had a slide show at an event his ex was at and the last slide was Stephanie Seymour in the nude so the "I will show you" was in full effect but I still think he's a pig. #stephanieseymour
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
And yet Dodger fans continue to wonder why parking is $15 and beer is $10...
11/03/09