Oh splendid, the utterly predictable "cupcakes suck" backlash story. Jesus, it's pastry. And I refuse to allow delicious icing delivery devices be besmirched in this way. If you don't like cupcakes, go eat a cruller. Or a donut. I'd suggest petit fours, but that might be too twee and cupcake-similar.

Well, that's where it got started.

It's called confirmation bias. Everyone does it, but conspiracy theory folks have really embraced it wholeheartedly.

Here's the thing, he's so stunning I've decided he's really an alien. So, I'm just studying him on a purely anthropological level. /shutup

She was scapegoated in no small part due to her vocal support of Democrats.

She's slightly asymmetrical. And when she smiles, it's accentuated. So, she's gorgeous, but just a hint off kilter. I think she's divine.

My sense, I read the book when it came out so my memory might be crap, was that as she gained confidence and stood up for herself, she blossomed. And indeed that very trembling blossoming fragility is what is shattered at prom. But like I said, it was a long time ago.

Word.

Because you're curtailing their privilege — their privilege to comments on your appearance at any moment it pops into their dudbro heads. Because as the object of their gaze, you should be happy that your appearance meets with their approval. See, otherwise they'd actually have to treat you with something resembling…

Thank you. I got into a whole thing with a jerk over at Gawker. (I know. I know.) Who just couldn't get that there was a time and a place of this sort of remark and a professional setting wasn't that. (I even gave examples of when, in the course of a work day, one might make a complement.) And he had a meltdown.…

I'm pretty sure someone has already written that story. Just can't remember the title.

Just wait until you're post-menopause. It's like being a ghost. We olds move through the world like smoke.

Thank you. God forbid a woman over 25 dress in a way that shows off her body. Sack cloth and ashes for the "olds." Fuck. Me.

I'm guessing you weren't a dumb undergrad. :) I just think Mad Men works on a lot of different levels and I imagine if I watched episodes now, I'd see some stuff differently, too.

Oh, I'm not gonna defend Betty. But it's clear that she's been so benefitted by the cultural norms that she can't understand why she's miserable. I'm not even sure she's aware of how miserable she is. And I agree, she does take something of a malicious delight in taking this out in her kids, but mainly because her…

You know what was shocking to me, was how common this sort of casual slapping/pinching etc was during that period. How do I know? I grew up then. My step-father would thunk me in the ear at dinner if I said something he didn't like. And hard. My mother didn't believe in spanking, but she was unusual. However, she…

What drives me nuts is that Betty was far more sophisticated than Don when they met. She graduated from Bryn Mawr and after school lived and modeled in both Italy and New York. She was educated, cultured, and independent.

Thank you as accurate an assessment of the (ever) current state of publishing. If she were forty-year-old junkie with meth-face, I'm guessing they wouldn't be quite so interested, no matter how delightful her prose.

And they rarely are flattering on the amply bosomed.