by Charlie the Tuna

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a cocktail
party of the mind

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San Francisco, CA, USA - I have tried to steer this space into being the place where you find advice on your emotion commotion, but that don't act as a barrier for those of youse who send me other kinds of e-mail. For example, I have one Loyal Reader who just loves to e-mail me stuff with a note attached along the lines of "This sure deserves the Tuna Treatment!" Sometimes I agree and sometimes I don't.

This time the guy sent me an article by some frail name of Carrie Hill Wilner over at Nerve. In the article, young Carrie - a Manhattanite herself - opens by explaining how happy she was that that HBO show "Sex and The City" is finally goin' off the air. I can relate to that. I can see how any actual young woman living in Manhattan would think that show blows. But the real kicker of the article is her celebration of women now being able to enjoy a "Slut Phase" of their lives without gettin' a "reputation". BRAVO! Charlie the Tuna is ready to go on record as sayin' I'm all for every gal out there havin' a Slut Phase.

Here's a brief excerpt from what Ms. Wilner had to say about her philosophy: Ý

I should state from the outset that I really don't know much about third-wave feminism, except that my ideas about it are probably wrong. (I think this has something to do with L7.) Somehow, I picked up the idea that it was a philosophy which dictated that it was okay to fuck a lot, show up to your grad-school interview in a plastic miniskirt and think Gloria Steinem was a total pill. It was kind of DIY: self-identification came first, then anything done by a self-identified feminist was an act of feminism, because this was her time - the dawning of the Age of the Self-Aware Slut.

But something unfortunate and inevitable has happened, which is that the freedom and beauty of the slut has been noticed, codified and replicated. Now it's not just a way to be, it's an aspiration, a point of competition. It's the girl who sees how long she can go without sleeping at her own place, like my friend Melanie. It's the girl who's trying to "collect all fifty states," like Alex, who lived down the hall from me. All this counting! Like any defined system of measurement - including the system of poodle-skirt wearing chastity - it can get oppressive.

Slut culture is accepted on a lot of levels, though the actual act of fucking many people may not be.

See, the first thing they'll teach you in Cultural Studies 101 is Reclamation of Terms. Epithets like "bitch", "nigger" and "faggot" are picked up by the groups they're directed at, then spat back ironically, proudly - ostensibly with a new meaning. (There is debate as to whether this process is constructive; I'm not sure what I think.) As was bound to happen, "slut" got picked up, mashed around a bit and printed across baby tees in sparkly letters. Along the way, it lost most of its meaning much faster than any of those other terms. (A T-shirt with "faggot" written across it in sparkly letters I have yet to see.)

Let's face one thing, as I give this woman's article the Tuna Treatment, that all of y'all have known for years: I like sleazy women. The sleazier the better. I don't want your Aunt Bea or some debutante; I'm looking for a woman who loves sex as much as I do and wants plenty of it. So, naturally, the kind of woman who shows up on Charlie's arm is automatically referred to as "slut", "ho", or "bimbo". No problem.

It's taken about ten years for this to happen, but finally the rest of the world has come around to a Tuna point of view. Women are celebrating the fact that there's nothing wrong with a Slut Phase - and that's progress. Men have gotten away with our Dog Phase from time immemorial. Am I right?

AND women finally havin' a Slut Phase means to me that at least a little bit of that economic equation - Will he be able to supply the cash for my grandchildren's education? Will he buy me condos and cadillacs? - is also off the table. That is, at least for the women I'm likely to have traffic with, frails in their late twenties and early thirties. Hallelujah!

Unfortunately, it's happening a little too late. As some of y'all know, the Tunaman is now looking at the back end of his thirties. I won't be able to pull the kind of frails that I've revelled in much longer. Woe is me. Frails in they twenties don't give me much of a second look anymore. And since I got outtah the hospital after them boys gave me the ass-whuppin', well -- I think you get the picture.

Targets, what there are of them left, are frails in their thirties these days. I got no prob' with women in their forties and early fifties, of course. I'm a dawg. As Ben Franklin said, the older broads are more appreciative. I can't even imagine how our Esteemed Editor pulls any poontang anymore. (Oh wait! He doesn't. He's the world's most reknowned celibate. Dumb shit.)

I look around me at guys in their late twenties and think, You lucky fucks! Hell, you got the best thing going on since the late 1960s and early 1970s! It's a party and you are all invited. Get it while you can.

Thangs bein' cyclical, as we all know they are, the Puritanical bent in American society will swing back strong and chicks will start locking those legs again. But for now, it's Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Enjoy it.

I'm not so sure, pardon me Ms. Wilner, that it is good that "Sex and The City" is cancelled. My reason is that I do think it acted as a catalyst for more women out there to acknowledge their Slut Phase. Without some socially acceptable outlet like that, the Puritan swing, the George W. Bush coterie impulse, kicks in that much faster. That's a bad thing.

Charlie the Tuna has always argued that Americans are all-too-willing to talk about sex, to use it in advertising everything from cars to beer, but they fuck less than any people on Earth. And you know I'm right.

So I got a bad feeling about that show being gone.

And that leads us to what you've all been waiting for, Ladies and Germs,

The Tuna Philosophy

This week's lesson has to do with the topic of re-upping on old lovers. Unless you left the frail/dude at gunpoint, chances are you can pull this off, my friends. So wait a few months and go back for more sensual action. You know the saying, "Time heels all wounds"? It's true. So instead of tryin' to get a new partner for making the sign of the double aardvark, just go back to some familiar territory. It's sweeter the second time around.

1. Pretend that you left on better terms thatn you actually did.
2. Think of the best times you had together and reminisce about them. Replicate.
3. Get him/her into bed ASAP.
4. Make it a "fuck buddy" situation this time, especially if it was exclusive before.
5. Stir and simmer

Until next time: Stay Hard.

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