"Women can generally smell "creepy guy you shouldn't be alone with" a mile away."

Oh, so that's why there are no more cases of battered wives.

"I've seen the most "loser" guy (fat, unemployed, insert "undesirable" characteristic here) go home with at least ONE woman sometime in his life."

Well, ok. But what you've seen has no more bearing on reality than what you do or don't get. What are we supposed to think? That because every guy you've known has gotten a date now and then, Soldini actually could have had a date any time he wanted but chose to make up a story about being a dateless loser? Let's go up to people who can't read and tell them that everyone WE know has learned to read, so they obviously can read, too, but must be too lazy to do it or something.

"I was making the point about the "casual"/"physical"-only "relationships" I've had with females. "

I know. And, believe it or not, there are people who are not capable of even that.

I'm not trying to slight you, either. I guess I'm just saying that you aren't enough of a loser to understand what losers go through today. I hope that doesn't insult you )

"I doubt any straight woman -- even the kind with a stated preference for "bad boys" -- has ever said to herself, "Hmm, I'd be really into this guy if he weren't so compassionate, thoughtful, and respectful. If he'd just dick me around and insult me a little more, I'd want to rip his clothes off.""

Okay, I'll defer to your wide experience as a man trying get a date with a woman.

"But the real action, the real heat of desire, is about the perception of danger, not safety. . . most women, I hazard to say, want some spark, some intensity in their sexual relationships. . . It's possible to be nice and yet also a little dangerous...to be kind without being a pushover. "

Excellent. This is a perfect crystallization of what the men here are talking about. Sure, people like excitement. But this person has, for some reason, acquired the stupid idea that to have excitement you need danger, and that danger is exciting.

I would have thought there are plenty of things that are exciting but not dangerous: buying a new house, being surprised with a big bunch of flowers or a big shiny necklace, getting a promotion, just dropping everything one weekend and taking a spur-of-the moment vacation, meeting his/her parents, etc etc etc. And I thought you don't have to be dangerous to not be a pushover (my stepmom being a perfect example of this). Am I wrong? Do I have to be willing to punch someone's lights out in order to keep them from not giving me the extra large fries I ordered? Is that even the kind of society we want to live in?

Danger is bad, folks! People avoid it for a reason.

Good luck with your life, Miss I-Like-Danger. As the Chinese say, may you get exactly what you want.

"Maybe the NRA people are right, and it would have been best if someone had shot him at the gym the moment he went for his weapon."

Which they obviously could have done with the lights out.

"Especially for women, alcohol has tremendous appeal as a way to calm our fears and blunt our miseries"

Well, that makes it alright then. I won't condemn women who drink and drive anymore.

All I want to know is: how like "Deathproof" is this film? Because if they are both 90% interminable, endless conversations by douchebags conversing about how cool they are and 10% ludicrous action scenes* then I think I'll be giving this a miss.

*If you are driving a car with a friend on the hood, and someone tries to run you off the road, whatever you do DON'T STOP! Because then, your friend will be able to get off the hood and the scene will lose its tension!

It was the MPAA ratings board that wouldn't let him put the word "bastards" in his title. Because if we saw that word we'd be rioting in the streets, I guess.

So you think it's foolish for the media to be preoccupied with sex scandals? Did you know this headline is currently on Salon's front page: "Letterman classes up his sex scandal"

"He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself."

Or, in other words:

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a communist;

Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist;

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist;

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew;

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out for me.