There’s no denying it, this post is a rant. So, I’ll try to keep it short. After all, I’m blogging every day at the moment, so it’s not as if there won’t be more words tomorrow. I’ll try and make those words a bit cheerier than these, too.
Those of you who read regularly might well remember Hannah Gale-gate – Hannah wrote a blog post for the Metro where she lovingly listed the ’21 Unsexiest Things About Sex.’
Cosmo, I think, has now gone a step further with this. It started pretty well – I clicked on a post called ’12 sex things men really don’t give a crap about.’ But the universe insists that each and every sex-positive list post must be balanced by a sex-negative one, so, when I foolishly looked at the sidebar of ‘clearly Cosmo has absolutely no fucking shame at all,’ I was lured into clicking on this bullshit.
I could have written this post from a ‘oh great, another article that makes me feel shit about having a physical disability’ angle. But you know what? I’m not going to. I don’t think clumsiness, or even perceived clumsiness, is the preserve of those who aren’t able-bodied. I’ve lost track of the number of women who’ve commented or tweeted since I started this blog to say that they too can’t wear heels, and that they wish they could, even though they’re, guess what, able-bodied.
People are clumsy, no doubt about it. They smash mugs with alarming frequency, they trip over invisible objects, they get their hair caught in the zip of their dress. But it’s not special: *everybody* does those things at some point in their life. It doesn’t FUCKING MATTER.
Yes, I’m angry. I’m angry because I think this perceived lack of grace affects women in a number of different aspects of life – sex and sport being the two that spring most quickly to mind. But mostly I’m angry because that post was written by ‘Anonymous Cosmo staffer.’ You want to write this kind of lame bullshit? Fine. But have the guts to fucking *own* it.
Sex blog (of sorts) 
Ok, so I did once fall off my husband when attemting reverse cowgirl on the sofa, but it was worth the risk up to that point… this list is fairly withering, isn’t it? I’m unco-ordinated and clumsy etc but I can put a condom on with my teeth, and at least attempt various things on that list without too much fall out.
I’m not even offended as a possibly dispraxic, graceless person, because it’s just a ‘what angle on sighing about sex can we take that hasn’t been done before to make people read the magazine’ blah blah that really doesn’t matter. Yeah, it’s crap, and just suggesting that there’s a list of things differently abled people *can’t* do rather than focusing on ways they *can*do them… *sigh*
Yeah, I think you should just forward this blog post to Cosmo, who maybe genuinely don’t realise how offensive they are. I really don’t want to read next month’s feature ‘Why fat people can’t have sex’.
I can barely walk up a flight of stairs without tripping at least once and I have dropped and smashed every phone I have ever owned. And my Ipad. I’d still give most of those things in that article a go regardless! Also that article reminded me why I avoid Cosmo and most ‘women’s’ mags in general.
it reads to me like it is not supposed to be taken seriously, but maybe that is just me?
No lovely, I don’t think it’s just you. I don’t think it is *supposed* be taken seriously, I’m just a little worn down by the sheer volume of unfunny, pointless crap like this there is out there when I know people who write so much better than their ‘journalists!’
cosmo used to in its heyday have really amazing literary excerpts & now they have been reduced to using ridiculous names for body parts…it actually makes me sad…
I’m not sure about the US, but when I was a teenager, my mother and I used to get it and laugh, but there were occasionally really good things in it – then the editor left, and her last edition was a tour de force, really literary and interesting and … good. The it descended into the crap it is now after that.
You know, it’s not just the ‘supposed to be funny’ thing – it’s the whole picture of the ditzy, useless girl who’s being condescended to, the darling of rom coms who needs a makeover. Where are the clumsy men, eh?
I’m sort of trying to write an emotionally clumsy man – or at least, one who’s as emotionally clumsy as the FMC – in my novel. And I don’t want to redeem him at the end, really. Real people make mistakes, and that’s ok. Of course, this all means self-pub route is pretty much inevitable…
Poor writer is perpetuating a stifling construct. In my experience falling-off-the-bed sex is some of the funnest…