‘…even educated flees do it.’
Please put my name down on the petition to abolish the useless Monarchy that has set up camp in England and refuses to leave. If I have to read one more ridiculous story – actually, NON-story – or news tidbit about over-privileged Royal parents and their offspring, I’m going to puke up my fish n’chips. After all the details of the last birth wasted millions of pages of paper,we are about to embark on Round Two. How she feels, how big she is, what she wears, how many times William gets to visit her, who takes the longest on the toilet… I Don’t Give A Crap Anymore! The “Miracle of Childbirth” isn’t reserved for The English Monarchy. Little brown dogs on the meanest streets manage to produce litters of puppies using the exact same method and their offspring are often taken away from them at birth and euthanized. Oh and by the way can we please stop mentioning that “William married a Commoner.” Are they serious with this shit? In the 21st century this is about as relevant as the “Divine Right of Kings”. And “Your Royal High-ness”, what the fuck does that even mean? Of course we are to blame for continuing to hold these people above mortals. Time to catch up people. Princesses and fairies and sorcery belong back in bedtime stories. Oh wait a minute that’s how this silly nonsense keeps on going… with a new set of indoctrinates born (literally) every minute. I think we should pity this young girl (or silly little mindless, unscrupulous social climber) for marrying into this brood of morons in the first place… She’s “royally” F*%ked. But I think she knows. After all isn’t it how this whole thing started ? William, editor, Battery Park
Tosspot Despots
One of the biggest gripes I have with people that say things like, “You paid $1200 for that vacation and yet their are children starving in Africa!” or “Did you know a penny a day from every New Yorker could feed three Third World nations for a year?” I understand the point, it’s obvious that if we all chipped in more (something I feel we all need to do) we would get more done and people wouldn’t starve, or die because of lack of water or no medical supplies. The only problem I have is that instead of pointing the finger at individuals living in a structured society, why isn’t the onus put on the leaders of these countries where their people are dying because of no access to basic life necessities? Aid is given in the billions – by America and other nations, hell Vanity Fair, VANITY FAIR, put Bush on their cover for his contributions and donations to the AIDS crisis in Africa – yet people are dying in record numbers worldwide due to governments not providing basic care for their citizens all the while lining their own pockets with our aid money. I think the emphasis and finger pointing should be directed at nation’s leaders and hold them accountable for once. I understand that cutting the aid program only hurts those it’s meant to help and protect but there has to be greater oversight in the allocation and distribution of our goodwill. In these times of instantaneous electronic transactions why can’t we have stringent cyber safeguards in place? I know the US has some strange bedfellows in the world today but seriously, taking a country with zero GDP and watching the president build another multi-million dollar palace while we pour in billions eats away at our good intentions. We are only human after all. Jonathan, retail, SI
Surreal Housewives
Could you imagine if your life was that of a “Real Housewife?” I mean I can. I watch enough and by that I mean all of the “Housewife” franchises to know how to throw a swanky dinner party and when at that dinner party is the appropriate time to throw a glass of wine into some bitches face. Or when it is the right time to confront another bitch about the comment she made in an interview with TMZ about a dress I wore two weeks ago. I’m also really good at random and casual lunch dates while I should be working, booking flights the night before to Bali and arguing with other cast mates about other cast mates. So where do I sign up? Wait. The mist is clearing, the light is getting brighter, my senses seem to be returning and thank god my intellect appears to be in tact. YES, praise be, it was only an horrendous nightmare that has left me soaked, exhausted and shivering with fear. It might take some time to sleep with the light off again but the alternative… no, please don’t take me back there! Marci, NGO volounteer, UWS
Burrito Masterpiece
I’ve read these “Bitch” letters every time the issue comes out and some of them have “Bitched” about rudeness in all forms: taxi drivers, people talking loud on cell phones (something that doesn’t happen anymore because of texting), smelly subways, homeless people, and a slew of other daily obscenities. One I would like to add to NYC do’s and don’ts: Texting while walking. How many times are you walking anywhere, not just a city street, and there are scores of people face down texting, blocking the walkway, not giving a shit about anyone around them, just silently tapping away? We had Gen X, Gen RX, now… Gen LOL. Also Being in NYC I have learned to just take in the ambiance of everywhere I go. Sure, I hate tourists more than anything else, but they are stopping to takes pictures of places I walk by everyday. I should probably stop for three seconds and also just look up to see what it is they’re taking a picture of. But on another note why are they taking a picture of Chipotle? Pleeeeeeeeease. Mary, chocolatier, Sutton Place
Sex and The Single Girl
If I am currently not in a relationship, it isn’t because I’m depressed, it’s because I’m happily single. Happily Single doesn’t mean that I’m against relationships, It just means that for this period of time I’m not looking to be in a relationship and am having fun dating myself. What I hate most about this topic is the assumptions and categorizations that go along with it. “Are you gay?” “Are you lonely?” “Are you dealing with a lot of stress?” “Did you have a bad breakup with the last guy?” Why can’t the assumption just be left at happy and single? Not looking, not upset about the last relationship, not interested in the same sex (which I never understood how being gay goes hand in hand with being single), just not currently in a relationship. There are all these negative connotations that go along with a woman not being in a relationship, but why? When men are single it’s simply left at “Oh, he just hasn’t found the right girl yet”. So why can’t it be left at the same sentiment for women, I just haven’t found the right guy yet. It’s 2014 yet people are still hesitant about going out to eat by themselves, taking a yoga class alone, going to a movie by themselves, and for what? If we can’t love ourselves, by ourselves then what are we doing by trying to love someone else? Being single isn’t an omen for the future, and sure as hell isn’t harming anyone. So instead of shaming someone for not having a beau, let them go through the motions of dong what they want at their own pace, because there doesn’t have to be anything wrong with them just because they’re single. Maureen, legal sec. Bed-Sty
Eat Me
Here’s one day in the life of my small intestine lately: Breakfast: Bagel smeared thickly with cream cheese at Au Bon Pain Lunch: Burger and chocolate thick shake at Shake Shack Dinner: greasy NY pizza followed by Haagen Dazs for desert. I have never felt more like Jabba the Hut in my life. America? More like Nal Hutta, Jabba’s crib. I know part of it is about self control, but it surely doesn’t help when we’re overloaded with 10,000 fast food ads on TV each year and served supersized proportions. I think the final (supersized) straw for me was when I saw a man rummaging through a restaurant dumpster the other night with a clown mask on, and it hit me – he’s hungry, whereas I actually have a choice. That choice being that it is time to de-Jabba. Matt, server, Midtown
Stick Your Chest Out, Lena
Is Lena Dunham’s body that much of a monstrosity that it must be the main talk of the new hit HBO show “Girls”? Sure, her curvy and plump physique is almost always nude in close to every episode but does it really need to be commented on? Would people be repulsed if they had to see a size 0 or 2 naked in every other episode? I’m not sure, truth is, I too used to think to myself, “why is Lena Dunham always showing her butt cheeks”, is it absolutely necessary? But then I stopped because I started to realize that Lena Dunham had a point, why shouldn’t she be naked? Maybe Dunham’s approach might seem a bit odd to many, but she’s showing her character’s individuality and uniqueness to the camera for all to see. Her position as the writer, director, producer and main actress has granted her the position to do whatever she thinks would be beneficial to her role and the show as a collective. And although it might not be necessary, it’s art, or at least the way SHE expresses art. When we watch any TV show, we are transported into the story that that director, writer and producer want us to envision and be keen on. It’s a one-way ticket to these fictitious character’s lives, and so we will see what they want us to see. Our opinions will always be ours, our responses will always be ours, but by shaming Lena Dunham for being public and essentially comfortable with her body, what are we as viewers getting out of that? I feel that us viewers are at fault and extremely distasteful in our approach to put down Lena Dunham every chance we get for her public display of limbs and should embrace that, yes, most of us are naked underneath the clothes we wear. Let’s take a look at Game of Thrones for a second shall we, most of the episodes consist of vulgarity, violence, rape, incest, sex upon sex, but we still watch it. Do we shame any of the characters for raping one another? No, because it’s fiction and so is “Girls”. Lena Dunham’s character, Hannah, is a fictitious character on a quest for her own piece of mind as a writer and as a 20 something year old living in New York City. Hannah is a young, naïve and curious girl looking to just live her life like everyone else. So what if that means she seems “free” and likes to show her breasts while filming. Point is, yes, we all have the choice to change the channel once we see something we don’t like or find entertaining. However, instead of shaming someone for their body or making jokes about it, why don’t we get on Lena Dunham’s level and be as comfortable as she is with all-size nudity. Sally, social worker, Queens