Confessions
Confessions
How to Give a Sex Ed Lesson at a Slumber Party

A dad friend of mine, who’d read my recent piece on making sexual assault in the news a teachable moment for kids, forwarded me the following tweet from Andi Zeisler while I was in the middle of my 11-year-old’s birthday slumber party: The 4th-grade boys coming to my kid’s slumber party tonight are really in […]

Confessions
Talking to Your Daughters About Comfort and Consent

A friend recently wrote us about her real world application of some of the advice Lo recently gave in “How to Prevent a Brock: 10 Practical Ways Parents Can Fight Rape Culture.” We couldn’t be more delighted! Raising conscientious kids with agency — especially girls — is possible in small, everyday ways like this: I wanted to […]

Personal Essays
Confession: Saying “Yes”and Finally Meaning It

KERRY NEVILLE — author of the award-winning short story collection, Necessary Lies, and the forthcoming collection, Remember To Forget Me — writes of the long road toward true consent.   Natalie and I played boyfriend and girlfriend: She was “Michael” and I was “Rebecca.”  We would walk around the block holding hands and when we reached […]

Say Amything
The Game Called “Birth”

The following is the first installment of a hilarious ongoing series by author and squirrel hunter (seriously) Amy Bronwen Zemser called “How to Thaw Your Unborn Child,” about sperm donation and artificial insemination when you’ve got an acute case of lesbianism: Ever since I was a kid, I’d wanted to have a kid. When I was nine years old and […]

Personal Essays
I Took My Kids to the Jeff Koons Retrospective (Oops)

My family had an opportunity to visit New York City for a full week recently. It was the longest my husband and I (the Lo half of Em & Lo) had been there since having kids. Before breeding, we’d lived there for years, gorging on the countless cultural opportunities at our disposal. Post-spawn, we moved to the […]

News
Kavanaugh Is a Teachable Moment

These days, you hear a lot of parents bemoan the fact that they can’t have the news on, for fear their kids might hear something sexually inappropriate. That “America’s Dad” Bill Cosby drugged and sexually assaulted 60 women. That the Catholic Church has been a child-rape factory and cover-up machine for decades.  That our own […]

Personal Essays
You Don’t Have to Have a Dick to Date Rape Someone, You Just Need to Be One

The following is the story of a 30-something contributor who wishes to remain anonymous. I drove home from a recent Bumble date, crying the entire way. I had bruises on my neck, arms and chest from being choked and bitten. I bled for almost a full 24 hours after. It hurt to sit for days […]

Confessions
5 Reasons Why 20-Something Women Should Be (and Stay) Single

Edie Freedman is a student at New York University studying social and cultural analysis, politics and psychology. There she is a writer and editor for The Tab NYU. As a 21-year-old, soon-to-be college graduate, there are a couple standard questions I invariably get from extended family members: How did your mid-terms/finals go? What are your […]

Confessions
6 Reasons Why Bumble Is So Much Better Than Tinder

Edie Freedman is a student at New York University studying social and cultural analysis, politics and psychology. There she is a writer and editor for The Tab NYU. In the last few years, the dating game has changed. No longer does everyone long for a life partner, some like to casually date, and what’s one […]

Personal Essays
My Platonic Love for the Philadelphia Eagles

We don’t cover sports much around these here parts, for obvious reasons, but we were so moved by our friend Michael’s heartfelt post-game wrap up, that we just had to share it. This is love. Thank you all so much for watching the game at our house. And thank you for your emails of support […]

Personal Essays
4 Dating Myths We’re STILL Stuck With

Edie Freedman is a student at New York University studying social and cultural analysis, politics and psychology. There she is a writer and editor for The Tab NYU. There is no question that the dating game for young people has changed dramatically in the last decade or so, thanks to social media and quick, instant-decision […]

Confessions
What Pickup Artistry Can Teach Us About Consent and Better Sex

I studied and practiced “The Game”-style pickup artistry back in the day. This may sound far-fetched, but it’s actually shaped my attitude on the subject of sexual communication and consent for the better. One of the biggest teaching points of many PUAs (pick-up artists) relates directly to the topic in the news of late: sensitivity […]

Confessions
Comment of the Week: Unpacking the Sexual Misconduct of Unattractive Male Celebrities

Reliable commenter Dave had some provocative thoughts on the motivation behind some of these acts of sexual misconduct. [Note: his comments have been collated and edited for concision]: I’m sure the reasons behind the actions of [many of the male celebrities being accused of sexual misconduct lately] vary widely, but I do find it interesting that […]

Confessions
Comment of the Week: When Abuse of Power Is Your Fetish

Leave it to MVP Johnny to get inside the male mind and see that the abuse of power is the turn on for some: The common denominator I see in all these men – whether they’re rapists like Weinstein or just inappropriate jerks like C.K. – is that they like to venture outside the bounds […]

Pop Culture
When Your Son Wants to Wear Nail Polish…

Show him this! Em’s six year old is a cool, creative kid who occasionally likes to wear nail polish and hair dye. He also happens to be a boy. This — surprise, surprise! — means he’s been teased multiple times at school for it with the refrain “Only girls do that!” It’s a narrow world-view […]

Confessions
Comment of the Week: It’s the Anti-Abortion LEGISLATION, Stupid

Last week, it was revealed that Pennsylvania Congressman Tim Murphy, member of the House Pro-Life Caucus, had urged his mistress to get an abortion in the midst of  promoting anti-abortion legislation and views on Facebook and in political e-newsletters. Many people rightfully were appalled by the hypocrisy of this Republican representative, whose voting record has […]