>...for once (perhaps the only time) in thier lives, when you put on your wedding dress you do have a "mantle of beauty" that no one can take away from you<

1) Any woman who feels her beauty can be taken away (or centers on being a bride)is insecure and has problems a wedding dress (or a marriage) won't solve.

2) What does it say about a woman that the only moment she feels worthwhile and happy is when she's a bride? That's frickin' sad when a woman's entire life/potential for happiness shrinks down to having that moment.

3) Honestly, what is _with_ the women who think this is the only most important moment in a woman's life? I can think back to a batch of moments in mine that were terrific, and they didn't involve weddings. It's not that being a bride is the most wonderfullest thing in the world; it's that it has been hyped to be and people buy it.

>Personally, I loved that dress, and I loved it both because it was my wedding gown AND because it was a gorgeous dress that I just loved to wear. I tried it on millions of times before my wedding, it made me feel special and beautiful. And I don't think that's pathetic, as deering suggested.<

Um, what I _said_ was pathetic was the notion that:

>>...for once (perhaps the only time) in thier lives, when you put on your wedding dress you do have a "mantle of beauty" that no one can take away from you<<

That nonsense is the reason women become Bridezillas--and why weddings become a trial for a lot of people. That idea that a woman's greatest day is always the day she gets married 1)is false; 2) causes too many women to lose their sense of proportion. It doesn't make sense to invest that day with so darn much import--it's as if that day is the only one in which a woman becomes a person with beauty/power/autonomy, and that's simply not true. Let me ask you this--what _does_ that day symbolize to brides? If it's anything more than "I'm marrying the man I love," then it's too frickin' much.

>I don't know - there's a lot of bride-hating going on recently (Slate recently had a wedding issue that was an explosion of bride/wedding hate) and I just don't get it.<

Because society is wedding-crazy, and "bride-hating" is a way to strike back at the incessant media coverage and underlying pressure to get hitched. As well, it's a way to say that being married is not the only great way to live one's life.

>Now, when you drop your i-phone in the bathroom commode or swimming pool, then you lose your music player, music collection, camera, address book, and your phone all in one fell swoop. You might as well kill yourself while you are about it.<

Yeesh, that's a tech person's nightmare. Shoot, I put enough effort as it is into keeping my (relatively ancient) PDA undamaged and safe--and my laptop sufficiently backed up. And as fragile as Apple's iPod has proved, I'd really rather not take the chance on the iPhone. I'm in the "it's ridiculously expensive" camp, in any case. And the fact that the iPhone's battery dies after 400 charges or so and you have to send the entire unit in to Apple to get a replacement phone isn't making it any more attractive.

"When you're a Jet, you're a Jet all the way...

From your first cigarette--

to your last dyin' day...."

>It's the one where the ditzy homespun girl wants a perfect wedding replete with insane customs, insane relatives and borderline sadism.<

...which is presented as eminently admirable in the movie's lights. (Though one could ask why on earth groom doesn't stand up for himself and put the kibosh on this nonsense?) Flicks like this give rom-coms a bad name; female characters like this do worse...

>Something tells me that films with female leads probably die at the box office - unless they're aiming for the little girl market - i.e., the Little mermaid.<

Um...Disney made piles of money off TLM, BEAUTY AND THE BEAST and other animated "girl" lead movies because they had cross-gender appeal. And, as a historical reference, the original Nancy Drew book series was such a big hit because girls _and_ boys read it. It wouldn't have racked up the sales it did just from girls alone.

> it's funny how intellectual and/or political types are always recommending how successful companies sould run their businesses....<

...and it's funny how companies who continue to be successful are smart enough to listen to their audience and those parts of the latter they are under-serving. :)

>I say lets start a black list of actors, writers( are they writers or just movie execs) directors, etc. and shame them into never making another one of those dogs.<

Well, Nora Ephron and Nancy Meyers are responsible for a good half or more of the really lame rom-coms. If they had shame (or if their junk like SOMETHING'S GOTTA GIVE and YOU'VE GOT MAIL had died at the box office), they woulda quit long ago.

It's amazing how bad rom-coms can smother even the best actors in lemon tulle. John Cusack is a terrific actor, for example, but even he couldn't do much to save SERENDIPITY or MUST LOVE DOGS.

>Women are trained to bat their eyes and look fascinated when men are boring.<

Your stereotypes and assumptions as to what women are "trained" to do are boring, but I'm not batting an eye. (Jeez, where did you get that eye-batting crap? Next, you'll be swearing women faint when they hear bad news. :P)

>Men are trained to change the subject to themselves when women are boring.<

Stats, please. Again, we have the usual Broadsheet trolls giving up anecdotes as hard evidence--the _exact_ same thing they are quick to yell about when female posters give examples from their lives.