Ugly people are better at sex.

I spend about 80% of my free time drinking, and 10% of it in the bathroom. What do I do with the other 10%? Invent ridiculous theories on why we are the way we are, what's wrong with the youth of today, and why I can't stop eating cheese at every meal.

Welcome to my new feature: Barstool Sociology, where I share my infinite wisdom and my inability to be politically correct.

Today's theory: Ugly people are, by default, better at sex.

This one's a no-brainer. In our society, the prettier you are, the less you actually have to do. You can make a career out of looking good all the time. You can date anybody you feel like, and they'll most likely just be in awe that you're willing to be seen with them in public. You can get into clubs for free, you can charm even the most influential of figures without ever opening your mouth. So most people are who beautiful never try, because they never have to.

But, if you're not jaw-droppingly gorgeous, like most of us, you have to cultivate a personality. You have to inure yourself to the people you're pursuing. If you want to sleep with people who are more attractive than you are, you have to be more than a one-trick pony. You have to have at least a few redeeming qualities - maybe sharp wit, good comedic timing, and the ability to offer a partner mind-blowing oral sex.

When we have really good sex, we are thinking one of two things about the person we are with:

• I am enjoying this because the person I am sleeping with is very attractive.
• I am enjoying this because the person I am sleeping with is very good at it.

Rarely, very, very rarely, will a person be thinking both things at the same time. And if you ever are, I recommend asking the person to marry you, because it ain't gonna happen again.

Here's the thing: ugly people have to be good at sex, or the more attractive partner that they've been with will never sleep with them again. The worst sex I ever had was with someone whom I slept with out of guilt and desperation. Unsurprisingly, he was also the most physically unattractive person I ever slept with. It was like getting punched in one breast, and then the other. I had to add a mutant of a human to my "list," and I didn't even get my rocks off.  He apparently didn't understand that since he was far more unattractive than I am, he is required to try harder. He was required to work at it if he ever expected me to bear with looking at his hideous face and mediocre body ever again. Needless to say, I spent the next three brutally long months of my life screening my phone calls and ducking out of my dorm room at odd hours.

This paradigm, however, thus makes individuals who are average to slightly above average in attractiveness the ideal partners. If you date someone outrageously gorgeous, you'll be subjecting yourself to dead fish syndrome or a two-pump chump. If you date someone hideous, you'll be subjecting yourself to takeout and Netflix every night because you're too humiliated to be seen in public with them. According to my theory, most individuals need to date someone who is attractive enough that looking at them is enjoyable, but just ugly enough that they are concerned about your eye wandering and will overcompensate in stairwells and friends' bathrooms. Consider all your mating problems solved.

I'm even slut-shamed by my cervix.

The horror, the horror.

On Wednesday I have to have a LEEP. If you don't have a cervix, skip to the next paragraph, because I doubt you'll give a shit. Basically, I have precancerous cells, and the next step is to take an electrified loop of wire and shave off a layer of tissue, after which I can't have sex, lift anything heavy, or take a bath for a month. Woohoo!

So I'm reading up on it, and here's what the Wikipedia page has to tell me about how my lifestyle is responsible for this:

"A number of risk factors have been shown to increase a woman's likelihood of developing CIN,^[9] including poor diet, poor personal hygiene, multiple sexual partners, lack of condom use, and cigarette smoking."

Alright, here is where I want to say, fuck you very much, medicine.

Oh, you had sex with a bunch of people? Yeah, it's your own fucking fault that you're well on your way to cancer. You didn't use a condom every time you had sex? Get ready for us to remove a big chunk of your internal tissue. I find it way too convenient that what modern medicine tells us is the best for women is - hmm - EXACTLY what the patriarchy feeds us. Apparently, unless I sleep with one person, live completely sober, and pop out a bunch of babies in my twenties, I am essentially inflicting myself with certain death by terminal illness. I'm sorry, but I think this is fucking bullshit.

And here's the kicker: cervical dysplasia (what I have) is caused by HPV, which I am vaccinated against. So, something's fishy here, right? Here are the options that I'm considering:

1. Gardasil, the HPV vaccine, doesn't work.
2. Doctors are fucking idiots.
3. I have been cursed by a Somalian witch doctor at the behest of my ex-boyfriend who threw a ceramic heart I made him in a river because I dumped him for someone else and he made me a video of pictures of me surrounded by flowers with an accompanying crappy poem and I deleted it off my computer without watching the whole thing and called him a creep. 
4. The changes in my cervix are my version of normal - seeing as I've had cervical cell 'changes' since I was SEVENTEEN - and this is simply a ruse, so they're terrifying me with the C-word so they can get my insurance company to pay for a somewhat expensive, not-very-necessary outpatient procedure.
5. God is really trying to get back at me for saying "Jesus shit" all the time.

Oh, and it goes on, for as long as we ladies shall live. If it's not a Pap smear, it's a hysterectomy. We can't give birth like our bodies were designed to, so we all have to have C-sections.  The medicalization of women's bodies in our culture is both pervasive and perverse. It's a way to reap maximum profits and ensure that reproductive power - the only kind of power that is strictly held by women - is chained down for society's sake.

All I have to say is, whatever painkillers they give me... they better be good enough to make me forget my own name and the fact that I have a vagina at all.

the post in which I make fun of abstinence-only sex education and die a little on the inside.

I was your run-of-the-mill suburban WASP type. I grew up in a house where sex was NOT discussed, save for a conversation with my mother at age 19 when she confessed that she found oral sex disgusting. Needless to say, everything I learned before having sex, I learned from inept, conservative, middle-aged sex education teachers. 

I didn't go to school during the era of abstinence-only education, though, and I thank the non-existent higher power for that. I was given enough of an education to know that condoms are effective, all chlamydia requires is some penicillin and the nearest abortion clinic was 35 miles away. I didn't learn about female orgasms (naturally, the discourse of desire fails women), but that what was my trusty $12 novelty vibrator from Spencer's that my boyfriend stole for me was for.

So I'm frustrated to see the outright lies that these government-funded "educational" groups lay thick on kids nowadays. A sampling:

- You can get HIV from sweat and tears

- 40-day old fetuses are "thinking people"

- Condoms are effective less than 70% of the time

- Abortion causes breast cancer and sterility  

Not to mention the fact that they either stigmatize queer youth or leave the LGBT experience out of teachings entirely, and perpetuate ridiculous gender stereotypes that are designed to boost the patriarchy and keep women devalued.

Apparently, as part of the curriculum in many states, they make kids in junior high draw (I use the term liberally) posters depicting the ills of sex and the joys of retaining your hymen. Note, of course, the onus is on girls to stop boys before they go too far - and if they get knocked up, it's their fault. I'm not criticizing the kids that make these posters - how are they to know better? I'm just furious that moralistic assholes who want to spread their bullshit gospel put young people's lives in jeopardy because they refuse to acknowledge reality and give teens the tools to protect themselves.

Let's read the inanity and weep, shall we?

 

I think this is probably the best advertisement for the rhythm method that I've ever heard.

I really like how this one throws in a "but," like, getting STDs is wicked awesome, but, then you might have to blow all your after-school job money on some offspring. Bummer, dude.

WHO GETS PERMS ANYMORE?! I'd much prefer a sticky white substance over an hour of burnt hair smell and months of poodle hair.

This bitch makes it sound like "intimate affection" is a bad thing. I bet her mother makes her douche with Lysol.

Reach for the stars! 

Intercourse: a one way ticket to quadruple-bypassville.

Uh, kiddo? Nobody told you about how propagating the species actually works, did they? Awkward.

Sex kills! So wait until you're married! So you don't die alone! I'm going to go kill myself now.

I'm not a candy. I also do my Kegel's. Nobody knows the difference.

I'm pretty quick to refute this one. Talking is dangerous. Talking is where your heart gets broken, not when someone's between your legs. It's pretty hard to tell someone their grandmother died mid-coitus.

It terrifies and saddens me that we're making junior high school students submit anti-abortion propaganda for a school project. The "mother" emphasis also really blows my mind. No wonder she aborted you - that's fucking obnoxious.

This is a great message, but it negates itself. First of all, if I'm using condoms, the implication is that I will not have a baby to feed. (That's what condoms are for, FYI, you adorable little undereducated tweens). And all I gotta do is put some Alpo in a bowl labeled "BABY," plop it down on the floor and we're good to go. Like pets, only you birth them!

There will be someone who will come along in your life. Someone incredibly attractive who you will think about from time and wish that you had bedded. And trust me, until you masturbate to someone you haven't seen in five years, you don't know the meaning of "too late."

v-cards: part one of a two part series.

Back in the days when I actually wore lingerie and bathed on a regular basis, I was a burgeoning sex kitten. I had a belly button ring and a list of makeout spots. I was a self-titled "good time girl." I liked being kinda slutty - it was a badge I wore with pride.

I wasn't unusual. Of the hundreds of people in my graduating class, I knew only a handful of virgins. Everybody did everybody. Sex wasn't so much a rite of passage as an unwritten rule. We were young, we drank Popov vodka, we went skinny-dipping. My group of friends was so sexually voracious (and bored) that many of us ending up hooking up with each other. Most of it happened in my basement (sorry Mom and Dad). And most of it was messy. I'll never forget certain incidents involving a stained t-shirt and a midnight romp down my street clad only in boxer shirts.

I don't regret any of it. My sexual exploration as a teen was completely natural and entirely pivotal to my development. I wouldn't be as awesome as I am now had I not learned a few things along the way. Among my greatest learning experiences were the two virginities I destroyed.

The first one was an accident. I didn't actually find out about it until a good three years later.

At age 17, in the middle of summer, and in the midst of a dry spell, I proposed what I liked to call a "business arrangement" with a friend.

This friend was more than a friend. He stuck his tongue in my mouth when I was 13. We spent our entire eighth grade Washington, D.C. trip with his hand surreptitiously down my pants. We fooled around everywhere, and we had a lot of firsts. We parted after middle school, when he was sent to boarding school and I went to a public high school.

We stayed in touch and went for friendly car rides on some weekends and holidays. I hadn't viewed him as a potential sex partner - I was young and had lost my virginity to my high school sweetheart just a year prior. He was back at his parents' for the summer. He was kind and gentle and nothing like me. He liked lacrosse and wore khakis. I had come out as bisexual and listened to Alkaline Trio. But goddamn I was desperate.

I hadn't intended on making it with a virgin. He had told me previously that he met a girl at school named Kate who had popped his intangible cherry, but that it had gone kaput prior to the end of the school year. Finding myself adrift in a sea of losers, he seemed like the perfect option. I gathered my courage and sent him an instant message. I proposed an agreement - hookups whenever one of us felt like it, with no strings attached. It was perhaps my most brilliantly engineered relationship to date. He eagerly agreed, and I made a date for our first rendezvous.

I showed up at his parents' whitewashed stately colonial house around 1 pm. He had the kind of parents who had money but you really didn't know how; they drove brand-new Volvos and played tennis and were never home. He came to the door and planted a sloppy, wet kiss on me. It didn't get much better from there.

We hurriedly made our way upstairs and started getting down to business. It didn't take long before I started wondering why he was so... bad. No rhythm, no natural sense of movement. I got on top and remember staring at the sports-themed border in his still-pristine childhood bedroom, and all I could think about was... balls. I worked my magic and expected results, so we could wrap it up. I was surprised at his longevity. He suggested we go take a shower.

Now this should have been it. I should have known that any man who would get in the shower wearing a condom and proceed to poke around my behind was definitely green when it comes to intercourse. He was too excited and all too eager to push the boundaries of our interaction. I yelped in pain and he backed off. He left me to finish my shower and was ready and waiting afterward with a new rubber. I admired his persistence and obliged, but I was weary of any future hookups. I held out for a month before getting back in the saddle.

We went on to have a lot of good times together, and I let the inelegance of our first time together slip my mind entirely. Several years after everything romantic or sexual fizzled out, on the heels of a very casual conversation, he dropped the bomb that our fateful afternoon was his first time. Part of me was horrified that he hadn't mentioned it sooner. The bigger part of me was relieved. At least he had an excuse for why it was so uncomfortable. My ass didn't.

the world according to Chelsea.

I've been thinking a lot about my own personal dogma. I thought it was finally time to articulate my theory of living, be it as crass as it may seem. But, hey, to each her own. I don't expect you to be like me. I doubt your liver could handle it.

1. Do not marry someone unless you have had sex with them.

I don't even get this shit. It blows my mind that there are people in modern Western society who meet someone through church or some other socially-sanctioned "pure" avenue, go on three chaperoned dates with them, and then get engaged at Arby's. They then spend two months planning a wedding with sparkling grape juice and crepe paper streamers. We try on dresses before purchasing them, right? We won't purchase a car if we don't know how it drives. There ain't no marriage lemon law, and I don't like to hesitate. I'm a living exception to the rule that no one's going to buy the cow if they've been getting the milk for free since the second time they met.

2. Every day is worthy of a celebration.

Now I don't mean this in some "OMG life is so beautiful. I am SO blessed! Everything is perfect and I am so adorably awesome!" sort of way. What I'm saying is, why the hell not? Every day is a suitable day to drink a bottle of champagne or wear a party dress or dine at a fancy restaurant you can't really afford. Call it hedonism but I prefer to live my life and enjoy it while I'm still here. So pop the cork and pop it off.

3. Be a whole person.

I like dancing. I also like writing (though it's mostly blatherings about daily occurrences that irritate me or frothy poetic nonsense that I jot down and hide away). I also like arguing about politics, watching documentaries about cults of personality and home decorating. My point is that I don't look to one thing to fulfill me. I never grew up saying "I want more than anything in life to be a wife!" I am a wife, but more importantly, I'm a person. I seek fulfillment through my relationships with other people, but mostly I find that fulfillment in my relationship with myself.

4. Just get over yourself.

I've had the hardest problem with this lately. My envy has been eating me alive. Yes, of course I wish I didn't drive a shitbox from fourteen years ago/have acne AND wrinkles/work a 9 to 5/have lovehandles. And yes, I am pissed off at people who have things that are nicer than my own. However, if I didn't just get the fuck over myself, I would be obsessing about these things ALL THE TIME instead of writing hilarious blog posts for you to read. So actually, you should be thanking me for getting over myself so I can make the world a (warning: subjectivity ahead) better place.

5. Live and die by the Hitachi Magic Wand.

I'm not screwing around with this one. Really. REALLY.

Bow down, bitches, and give thanks to your saviour.

I don't know how to love Jesus.

I would make a West Virginia joke here, but I'll refrain, because it's the Christian thing to do.

I tried; I really did. I used to go to church on Sundays with my friend's family when I was eleven. I was excited to learn the Lord's Prayer and I took communion despite the fact I was never baptized. I used to beg my mom to buy me those hurricane candles in the grocery store with pictures of Mary's face glued to the glass. I was fascinated and enamored with the quiet, cold, insular, and ancient world of Catholicism.

And then I got a little older.

I wasn't raised with a religion, an issue I would torpedo at my mother during my pre-pubescent temper tantrums. "Why don't I go to Sunday School?" I would wail. My mother, nonchalantly, would reply, "Because those fucking bitch nuns ruined my life." My dad always maintained that he didn't believe in anything really, but if he actually cared, he'd be Buddhist.

Growing up in a very Italian, psuedo-religious town, it was hard not to feel left out. Now, there was no passion in any of it - it was tradition, it was going through the motions until you were confirmed, it was something you did to set yourself up for later in life, but it seemed like everyone did it. The only people who were actually dedicated, who went to church regularly, were the old widows, who'd kneel with their rosaries and pray for the health of their grandchildren and seek solace in the words of old men, much like the husbands that left them behind.

This past weekend I attended a VERY religious wedding, with the all the classic elements - insistence on honoring God in the vows, stressed importance on having Jesus as the focus of the marriage, backhanded comments about homosexuals and civil marriage. I tried not to roll my eyes. I tried to honor the belief system of these people (both of whom I actually like very much), much as I would hope they'd honor my complete apathy to any religious system, nearly all of which have been clear in placing women below men and systematically devaluing half the species. I can't subscribe to a set of beliefs that tells us to believe in the love and power of a God who lets people starve and allows extremists to kill thousands of people in his name. I also can't believe an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient being that supposedly created everything in the universe actually has a sex and a gender.

Now, don't get me wrong - Jesus sounds like a good person. It's just all the crap surrounding him that turns me off. I won't speak badly of the guy, but due to the circumstances, I just don't think it's going to work. It's not you, Jesus; it's the assholes who think they know you. It's the self-righteous pastors and priests who condemn all of us who fornicated, lied and cheated - yet those were the people you flocked to. You knew long before Billy Joel that laughing with the sinners was better than crying with the saints.

Just do us all a favor and tell the people who worship you to lighten up.