It's not just about women, and it's not just about television. Note the recent bios and articles of famous men (and Founding Fathers) that try to present the sexiest images, highlight their sexual history, and in general try to re-package the men as well as the women who created just about anything of value in the world.

There was quite a large spread given (here at Salon, I think) when a re-conception of Washington's image was unveiled, proving he didn't look like a shrivelled mushroom, a la the dollar bill, at all. He was quite handsome. WHO CARES? He could look like Quasemodo and have a one-inch penis for all I care. He's the friggin' founder of our country, a general who defeated the greatest army of the world and rejected the crown because he believed in democracy.

Even the latest edition of Penguin's The Complete Novels of Jane Austen has replaced the old pink cover, featuring a copy of the famous sketch by Austen's sister, with a sleek, ultra modern cover including the image of a sultry woman falling back in ecstasy.

It doesn't matter if you are a woman, or a great author, or the father of our country. What matters is can you be made to look HOT.

I always thought the goal of this section was to puruse things happening in the moment, as they related to women, and make a quick comment about them. A kind of squib-sheet to set the mind thinking. And that this was not the place for deep-think articles long considered before publication. That occurs on the main page. And a feminist (I'm using that in the positive sense) ethos hardly disappears when leaving this corner. I think people expect the wrong things of Broadsheet, and therefore tend to dismiss it as trivial.

Pictures of naked women or men, intended for sexual excitement, aren't porn? What an odd definition. Skin magazines prior to—what? Screw?—weren't porn?

Kind of wish they'd sent Buns out to interview the kids, though he obviously wouldn't have been so hilariously antagonistic. Nice to see a "young kids these days" skit in which the older guy is more despicable than the young ones. Good ole Gen X irony!

While I can see why a wedding day should be a bride and groom's most important day—it's the life changing moment when there are no longer two people but one couple, permanently—that's not what most current weddings are about. For a number of reasons. Chances are they are already living together and essentially married. The uniting of two people already occurred. And they are probably aware of the chances that the marriage will end in divorce. Don't know to what extent anyone is particularly civil-or-religious-minded enough that proclaiming their union to society or God, and looking for the blessings of either, really matters.

For all these reasons, I think the real import has been lost. It has become a trivial "this is my pretty princess" day. Weak. A real debasement of what the ceremony, and any celebrations surrounding the ceremony is about.

And since weddings are big business that force people to spend much more than they should—both because spending that sum on a wedding is ridiculous, and likely they can't really afford it—it's important to speak against the phenomenon. Personally, I'd be happy if we went back to the "just wear the best clothes you already own, and the stone doesn't have to be a diamond" thing. There are definately signs we are going back in that direction. Maybe it's a cultural split, and only some people are returning to this. Maybe the whole Bridezilla thing is less the current evolution but rather the dying gasp of an outdated way to get hitched in our society. I hope it's the latter.

I wrote a response earlier in this thread about how much I hate current weddings and everything. The trash-your-dress concept seems to be a perfect example of conspicuous consumption and spoiled-brat-idis that others have mentioned.

But then Sparky J wrote that great letter, and I can see that there are a variety of reasons why women might make this choice, and enjoy it.

And what do you know? Not one person has responded to what she wrote, has acknowledged it, or the very good reasons (not that she has to prove anything to us) for trashing the dress. Lots of minds around here are closed real tight.

"The phone has all these great gizmos, it's well worth buying...it just doesn't work well as a phone."

Manjoo is seriously encouraging readers to go out and buy one of these things that cost $500 ("Pshaw," says Manjoo, "that's less than the cost of a year's subscription to the New York Times"), and yet the big news is that the phone doesn't work too well as a phone!

How are people missing the humor of this, not simply not enjoying it but not getting it. The interviewer is a jerk, and not half as smart as he thinks. ("What books did T.S. Eliot write?" Of course the correct answer would be "None." Because Eliot was a poet and sometimes an essayist. He wasn't a novelist. He didn't write books. But the full-of-himself interviewer doesn't even know he's asking the wrong question.) Even casting kids more moronic than any real life kid from any generation might be, the reporter is still worse.

It's also a commentary on the crap we Gen Xers went through with Boomers (who now coddle their own kids and never criticize and a trophy for everyone...why couldn't they have given us some of that treatment?), and the uncomfortable fact that just as WWII era adults brayed about what idiots boomers where and boomers resented it...then boomers started braying at what idiots Gen Xers were and we resented it...and now some Gen Xers are actually repeating the pattern.

It's irony!