Jezebel 
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New York, 11:15 PM
Fri Dec 11
71 posts in the last 24 hours
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11:08 PM
I think sharing among friends is vastly different than writing a memoir, but I think their is an idea out there that women share far more than they do (in my experience). I'm used to sharing problems, funny stories and basic info ("did you sleep with him?") but the Sex in the City rehash of every sexual encounter hasn't been my experience.
I've known a few women who work that way, but personally it bores me. I don't need to know how big your boyfriend's cock is, but if he has three balls that's kind of interesting. I just hope you don't tell me things he'd rather keep private.
06:28 PM
They fear that we will find out that we aren't the crazy ones, and they really are behaving unacceptably, and as a result they're not going to be able to get away with it anymore by just dismissing our complaints with "no other wife/gf complains about this; it's just the way I am."
04:34 PM
04:05 PM
(click thru for a cheap laugh on this very subject of TMI)
[www.mcsweeneys.net]
04:07 PM
"Dear Josie,
After repeated instances of vandalism and abuse, I have taken the step of locking the Wikipedia article on our sex life. Although I have previously banned both your user account and your home IP address, malicious edits have continued, both anonymously and from newly registered users "alanequalswanker" and "ooohImabigimportantadmin."
I know that's you, Josie.
Neutral point of view is a fundamental principle of Wikipedia, and no one with a neutral perspective could claim that, over the six months during which we were engaged in a sexual relationship, my performance was "lackluster," "uninspired," or "noob-ish" (or, indeed, "noobian"). Nor could the physical intimacy we shared—which at the time you clearly found extremely satisfying—be objectively described as "unsettling [like] watching the films of David Lynch in a car without a working handbrake while parked near the edge of a cliff."
02:57 PM
03:54 PM
04:10 PM
Pity the wife whose husband has disrespected her so many times that she no longer even wants to conjure enough consideration for him to avoid oversharing.
[Wives who are by nature cruel, manipulative, or whose lack of empathy is the result of a mental illness are exempt from such pity, although ones with mental illness may be entitled to other pity depending on their general condition and attitude towards such, as outlined in §598.65]
02:53 PM
02:27 PM
02:06 PM
It drives me insane when men like Tiger Woods, John Edwards or dudes I know cheat and then say, "I'm sorry for my transgressions. My wife is perfect/saintly/wonderful and it's all my fault". These words are so banal and lazy and rooted in a disinterest in her experience.
So many men who cheat say, "nobody understands me like you", or "you're nothing like my wife". Just as men are often uninterested in their wife beyond her role as a "good wife", the mistress gets relegated to a vessel to fill with his own experiences (and semen) while simultaneously filling him up with love and pride.
You know why your wife doesn't understand you? Because you don't talk to or listen to her. You know why she overshares? Because you don't listen.
02:17 PM
Men say these things to get laid. Period.
02:48 PM
Cheating is the ultimate passive-aggressive fuck you, and focusing only on the sexual piece rather than the emotional side is a defense mechanism to avoid admitting weakness. Yeah, men say stuff to get laid. But those lines justify in their minds that they aren't at fault because their wives are hurting them emotionally. Choosing them signifies some kind of ambivalence, and saying it's all about the sex is a lame attempt at avoiding gender-role conflict.
There are a certain percentage of men who are psychopathic and do not feel remorse, period. But most men who cheat aren't like this - these are dudes who are preoccupied by feeling undervalued and are desperate for attention. In our culture, powerful men have affairs, so it's a nice way of rationalizing feeling needy with being manly.
I read Tiger's text messages yesterday (God help me, they were in the Canadian Paper of Record), and this wasn't a guy looking for just sex - he is clearly really anxious about his manliness and attractiveness and looking for validation.
03:11 PM
03:21 PM
THIS. right there. core of the whole thing, and absolutely 1000% true. and yeah, not a typo there. 1000%.
01:57 PM
But 500-600 years ago, it was just a contraction of "God's sib," which was (OED), "One who has contracted spiritual affinity with another by acting as a sponsor at a baptism," like a godparent or something. Sib--like sibling-- used to mean a family member in general.
Then it sort of started meaning someone you were friends with--used on both genders, and had no negative connotations. Makes sense, yes? God-parent, spiritual friend, very close friend with whom you talk.
Then it also kind of started meaning particularly female friends present at childbirth. Also makes sense--the kid's godparent would be a close friend of the mother, right, and plus in ye olde daies childbirth often include a bunch of people. That's where the "gossip's cup" that Puck talks about in Midsummer Night's Dream--the ladies would all drink from the same cup o'wine to celebrate the birthing of a live baby, especially if the mother had actually survived the childbirth.
Then, of course, it started getting gendered. Because gods know if a bunch of women are sitting around doing stuff that men can't do (have babies) or that grosses men out (watching women have babies; helping women), it must be eeevvviilll, right?
Next thing you know, sermons are getting written about how husbands need to keep their wives away from "their gossip's kitchen" because wimmens will be "gossiping away" instead of doing important things, like making their husband's dinner or cleaning their husband's house or doing basically everything that kept the household running in the 16th century. Motherfuckers.
Anyway, now it's got a horrible, petty, silly, useless, and mean connotation. It's all about women and how empty-headed our conversation is, how catty we are, and how much we'd rather be talking shit about other women--usually the pretty hardworking ones--instead of doing our own work. All you need to do to see how little this BS has changed is to think of the stereotypical gossiping secretary, or, for example, the catty telephone operators on Mad Men.
Men have a problem with women talking to each other so much that they needed to make it a fuckin' sin. Because they know that if we ever all got together and started talking, we would NOT TAKE IT ANYMORE and down comes the patriarchy! That's why places like Jezebel are so incredibly subversive and exceptional. The way women talk around here is like a fucking ticking time bomb under the bridge of patriarchy and male privilege. How many times have we read threads where women open up about their experience with male violence or sexual assault--how many women have realized that they aren't alone in the morass of misogyny that is our lives? How many women have felt more comfortable taking a stand after reading Anna N's posts, or felt less weird about tampons after reading Moe's TMI pieces, or felt more comfortable being sexually assertive after reading Tracie's stuff, or realized how sexist the government is after reading Megan's explanations, or felt less isolated after posting in the comments, or felt like someone else said something they'd been thinking for years? I so frequently get PMs from people who say that they like my comments because they always 'felt the same way but never thought about it like that,' or articulated it such, or 'thought anyone was on the same wavelength.' Our presence here is slowly dismantling patriarchal bullshit, around for centuries--millenia!-- even if we don't realize how truly subversive this space is. No wonder people on Gawker and wherever make snotty comments about the caterwauling feminists here--they are afraid. They know we're like a loaded spring. Smooshed down and under intense pressure and just the right kind of shift will make us explode.
06:28 PM
01:50 PM
in other words, it is OK to be promiscuous and predatory as long as you keep your mouth shut.
head: desk (repeat)
01:48 PM
It does leave you wondering what the husband thinks about the book, but then again, I have often thought that about the women who appear in various permutations of books written by men. Because amazingly enough, women are not the only ones who use the people in their lives as fodder for literary careers, and memoirs are not the only venues in which that happens.
This gendered crap is really irritating to me because it is so myopic. Disdain oversharing in writing and literature if you like, but don't be an asslicking hypocrite about it. Be consistent, for fuck's sake. (Like that will ever happen, though. "People are dicks" is not quite as pitchable as "hey, look at this stupid thing men/women do!" Editors of the world, I BLAME YOU.)
01:15 PM
It seems to me, though, that the best way not to get your wife to write some kind of juicy memoir is to not do anything juicy. If you're worried about what your wife might say about you, either you married the wrong person, or you ought to stop doing something you're doing (or start doing something you're not doing). The men who can't keep their pants zipped can have nothing to say about what their wife tells. Nothing at all. If you wanted privacy, you should have turned to the person you married.
01:13 PM
01:19 PM
01:10 PM
How about you give your spouse nothing to write about? Or be flattered that anyone cares about your intimate life, because I doubt most 'wronged' husbands would be so tight lips if someone waved a book deal in front of them.
01:09 PM
The Week Men Tried To Pull One Over On Women By Claiming, In Writing, To Be Really Well Behaved?
You protect us from other men, you never speak ill of us... it's really amazing.