Last week, countless hours were spent attempting to do a parody of Ms. Blog, the embarrassment that Ms. magazine continues to offer. We were off writing "TV: Agent Carter demonstrates a path forward," and rejoined the group to find that the parody just wasn't taking.
Why?
It's hard to mock something that already has become such a joke.
A week later, Ms. Blog shows up with a post to back up what we were saying.
"Happy Birthday to Us! The 5 Top Blog Posts from the First 5 Years of the
Ms. Blog."
It's not just that there's something rather sad and pathetic about writing a post congratulating yourself -- but there is that.
This site, for example, started in 2005.
But you won't find any self-congratulatory pieces about "We just turned 5!" or "Happy 10th Birthday to Us!"
Or any of that nonsense.
But if you took nonsense out of Ms., these days, what would they be left with?
That became really clear as they were dialing the rotary phone and offering their five most popular posts:
"10 Things That An American Woman Could Not Do Before the 1970s"
"My Little Non-Homophobic, Non-Racist, Non-Smart-Shaming Pony: A Rebuttal"
"At 11th Hour, Georgia Passes ‘Women As Livestock’ Bill"
"Mattel’s New Monster High Dolls Play on Old-School Stereotypes"
"What Do Dress Codes Say About Women’s Bodies?"
Where to start?
There's a post on legislation.
That's good.
You might argue that it's good there's a historical post . . . except since Ms. is all about first principles, it should probably be something young readers could relate to, like "10 Things That An American Woman Could Not Do Before the 2000s or 2010s."
But is either the height of feminism for the last five years?
And that's before we get into the oh-so-needed posts about dress codes, Monster High Dolls and My Little Pony.
This is what you've got to show for five years?
Next up, Ms. tackles "Weebles: Welcoming Body Shape Diversity or Fat Shaming?"
Equally sad, the five years?
2014's not represented.
See, online, you're hoping to increase -- or at least maintain -- your audience.
The five most popular posts all came before 2014.
On the plus, at least there were none of those whoring for the Democratic Party posts making the top five. You know, Barack Obama's face and the claim that "This is what feminism looks like!" and all that followed which appeared to stop only at "Great Moments In Modern Feminism: Barack Scratches His Nuts!"
And thankfully, none of their posts glorifying the racist TV show Girls made it either.
Hint to Ms., you can't do a post complaining about people of color not being nominated for awards and also glorify a TV show -- set in NYC -- that refuses to add people of color to the main cast -- even after the face of the modern KKK Lena Dunham promised in season one that she'd be adding people of color in season two. (She'd go on to explain to Terry Gross that she didn't keep her promise because she couldn't write people of color -- they're just so strange and 'other' to Lena. This didn't explain why Lena, who pays men to write for her show, couldn't hire writers of color to do what she swears she can't.)
But what's the saddest thing of all about sitting alone at a table at night with your tiny little cake?
The blog is five years old.
Is the website?
No.
And if you're going to 'celebrate' yourself (promote, pimp and whore yourself), you might take a moment to note those who came before, to drop a little herstory on your readers.
What we're saying is that Christine Cupaiuolo is noted no where.
Who is she?
For years, before "Ms. Blog," Christine blogged at the website with "Ms. Musings."
Now since nothing the new blog has done in the last five years approaches the readership/audience of Christine's work, you could understand Ms. (yet again) embracing its inner Sour Grape Girl and acting as if Christine never existed.
It's a little more difficult, after all, to celebrate your 'successful' five years and also acknowledge that in, for example, 2005, Ms. had a stronger online presence and many more readers when Christine was blogging than they do today where the bulk of their posts come from interns -- paid or unpaid, by the way?
No, that wouldn't make the last five years look worth celebrating.