And the comments section is full of nice guys warning women that their looks will fade and then they will be lonely old hags neener neener.

That is nice. They're so concerned! Who knew having standards was on a biological clock? Nice guys, that's who!

Taibbi has privilege, sure. That's all true.

However, she doesn't (and I don't have to) write apologetically, or try and reason with fuckers who are never going to get it. You can write like you have privilege.

It's difficult. I've gone through stuff I've written and removed the bulk of apologies I've made just for having the audacity to write what I think.

I was just going to apologize for making this all about me, for example.

Oooh, a KitchenAid is definitely on my wish list!

It is GOD. My mom and stepdad gave us a $100 gift card to Best Buy when my stepdad cashed out his credit card reward points, and then we also had Xmas money from other family. So Tim kept agitating for the KitchenAid, and I kept pooh-poohing him. Finally he asked me what else did I want to spend the $$ on, and I couldn't come up with anything, so we got the KitchenAid.

IT IS GOD.

Although he has *never* used it, and I realized he only wanted "us" to get it so that I would make him baked goods more often. Sneaky bastard.

(And I am, in fact, using it tonight to make baked goods. He wins this round.)

I got a KitchenAid from my in-law's for Xmas last year, and it is awesome.

I love my KitchenAid so very, very much. Even moreso since I've managed to finagle both the meat grinder and pasta maker attachments as birthday gifts. (There is really nothing that makes one feel quite so badass in the kitchen as grinding one's own meat.)

I adore my 4.5 quart KitchenAid, but I'm still making eyes at the 7-quart Commercial model: [link]

Taibbi has privilege, sure. That's all true.

However, she doesn't (and I don't have to) write apologetically, or try and reason with fuckers who are never going to get it. You can write like you have privilege.

Right. She didn't have to insulate her point with all the details about how awesome her life is in order to justify saying single is okay, and I had a similar reaction of "okay, but I haven't had a fifteen year string of satisfying monogamous relationships and fascinating travel yadda yadda, so where does that leave me?"

(I should caveat that I read the article a while ago, so I'm going off remembered impressions.)

So I didn't mean to derail. Just to make the point that Taibbi et al are even a further step removed than you noted.

My mother's KitchenAid is sitting unused in her condo, because she hasn't cooked in probably four years and my dad is mostly limited to grilling things and boiling things. But she claims she still uses it, and probably believes that, so I just sit on my hands. I do have an acceptable mixer (a Sunbeam), it's not like I'm suffering.

I have my maternal grandmother's china, but I never use it and it's a very boring cream-and-pink-rose pattern that I don't much like. At some point I'll probably Ebay it.

I'm with you on what male writers get in terms of privilege, and I think it's been brought up throughout the femiblogosphere as well, that women get cover stories when it's about babies and relationships and that's pretty much it.

But I think that's a different issue. We're talking about writing with a million qualifiers, excuses, rationalizations. She didn't have to do that if her piece was just a Livejournal post, you know?

Which all leads me to a new question: Did they put her photo on the cover to show that she's conventionally attractive to further qualify that "there's nothing wrong with her"?