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Friday, July 10, 2009 - Posts

  • Did Obama Ogle the Booty or Not?


    When I saw this photo yesterday of Obama checking out this fine, shimmering booty, I felt—dare I admit this—a weird kind of pride. Obama has always portrayed himself as master of his own impulses. He exercises every day, doesn’t eat the cupcakes, dines every night with his kids, makes regular date nights with his wife. Nothing wrong with this self-control. It’s impressive, in fact. Except that it makes one long for some glimmer of the old male appetite ... (Read more in Double X.)

  • The Havoc Wreaking He-cession


    In Foreign Policy, Reihan Salam is predicting that male dominance will be a casualty of the economic downturn (or the he-cession, as he calls it, since more men than women are being laid off). He writes:

    The great shift of power from males to females is likely to be dramatically accelerated by the economic crisis, as more people realize that the aggressive, risk-seeking behavior that has enabled men to entrench their power—the cult of macho—has now proven destructive and unsustainable in a globalized world.

    What will follow is not a femitopia, but rather ... (Read more in Double X.)

  • It's Not So Fun to Outdo Your Parent


    Emily, you wrote yesterday about the tricky feeling of watching your son outperform you, and finding it discomfiting. But kids can be just as uncomfortable in the surpassing role as the parents are about being bested. My all-girls basketball team used to gather every Sunday afternoon to scrimmage our parents. It was mostly dads who took the bait ... (Read more in Double X.)

  • Rethinking Paris Jackson


    So between Marjorie and an e-mail from a friend, I'm going to recant a bit about Paris Jackson speaking at her father's funeral. I can’t take back that on a gut level I found the entire spectacle off-putting, but I ought to have reminded myself that being in the limelight can be tough, especially when you're having real feelings. What's genuine seems staged, what's staged is supposed to be genuine, it's hard to parse the difference, and the difference hardly matters ... (Read more in Double X.)

  • Why is Haute Couture "Toning Down"?


    A post from Double X writer Erika Kawalek:

    The Paris haute couture shows have come to a close. The reviews are in and there’s discussion going on about how luxury is being “toned down” for these “hard times,” how "fancy" is being "snubbed."

    In the case of the officially bankrupt house of Christian Lacroix this makes sense. He was forced to make do with bolts and scraps of fabric he already had lying around his studio. He drastically cut back on ... (Read more in Double X.)

  • Why Margaret Mead Kept Her Maiden Name


    Why do women keep their maiden names? Some of us take the answer to that question for granted: Those names are the ones we were born with. Others go ahead and swap when they get married. I don't have a big political wind up for this one: It's a deeply personal choice, there are a lot of factors to consider, and if my maiden name was something I thought dreadful or dull, I might have jettisoned it. After all, ... (Read more in Double X.)

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