Alas, a Blog

So as you know, yesterday we found out that there’s a new kind of woman out there: the “cheetah,” a girl who dates guys slightly younger and/or hotter than herself, or possibly a date-rapist, or maybe just someone with low self-esteem, or maybe a cow giving the milk away for free. I’ve read the column several times, and still don’t quite get it. But anyway, cheetahs: they’re women who have sex.

Cheetahs, of course, are part of an increasingly ridiculously expansive meme in which women who have sex are given a cutesy feline equivalent. Are you an older woman who likes sex? Well, then you’re a cougar. A thirtysomething who likes college-aged boys? You’re a puma. Older than a cougar, but still daring to have sex? Spencer Morgan proposes “saber-toothed,” because you’re old. Get it? Get it? Nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more?

Anyhow, all these feline descriptions got me to thinking: there are an awful lot of different members of the family Felidae, and many of them have not yet been used as pejorative cognomens to describe women who dare to enjoy sex.

That ends today.

Yes, today I’m happy to share with you a guide to all the many known cat names for different types of women. Feel free to clip and save this post; it will save you a lot of time, and allow you to deal with women as the strange, inhuman, bestial creatures they are, rather than as fellow human beings.

Bay Cats – Women age 24 to 29 who enjoy sex, surfing, and dating men either age 18-27 or older than 29, but never, under any circumstances, 28-year-olds. 28-year-old guys totally suck.

Barn Cats – Red-haired women from rural areas whose stated love for you will never completely cure them of their secret desire to seduce an unwitting international superspy into turning traitor.

Bobcats – Women named Roberta who are very attracted to men who detest Latvian cuisine, yet find Lithuanian cuisine sublime.

Caracals – Women who dare to like sex, yet find cutesy feline nicknames to be patronizing, demeaning, and dehumanizing. Silly little things, aren’t they, fellas? It’s almost as if they think they have feelings and desires of their own! Ah, women are funny creatures.

Cat Powers – Talented but mercurial singer-songwriters.

Cat Stevenses – Since 1977 conversion, are known as “Yusuf Islams.”

Cats – Women aged 35 years, 11 months, 12 days to 41 years, 10 months, 28 days who are incredibly turned on by Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals. Except for Starlight Express, because, I mean, roller skates? Really?

Fisher Cats – Women over the age of 70 who enjoy threesomes with male gymnasts and/or models, but also secretly have a crush on the late Chris Farley.

Kittens – Creepy old men call ’em “Jailbait,” creepy twentysomethings call ’em “Lolis,” Humbert Humbert calls ’em “Nymphets,” and John Derbyshire calls ’em “A little long in the tooth.”

Lionesses – Women who go out and work hard while their lazy, no-good boyfriends stay home and play Wii all day. Wait — sorry, folks, that’s a negative stereotype about men. Obviously, please disregard this one.

Lynx – Women under the age of 27 who are between 5’10” and 6’7″ and who enjoy dating men shorter than 5’8.

Ocelots – Women aged 23 years, 2 months through 23 years, 4 months, who like to date men who once played professional jai alai.

Panthers – Women age 19 to 23 who engage in serial monogamy with men whose hair is shoulder-length or shorter. Often (but not always) like food, breathing air, and drinking liquid beverages of some sort.

Servals – You may confuse these brunette, left-handed waitresses aged 37 to 42½ who enjoy one-night-stands with circus roustabouts with their closely-related sisters, the Oncillas, but unlike Oncillas, Servals find the prose of Dan Brown to be somewhat stilted.

Shorthairs – Would be the cutesy cat name given to lesbians, except those bitchez totally get annoyed when my bros and I ask if we can videotape them, so they don’t get a cute cat name, so there.

Siamese Cats – Asian chicks. Amirite, guys? Amirite?

Smilodons – Women who live outside of Schenectady, New York, who prefer to date men who live in their parents’ basements and blog in favor of conservative politics. Favorite aphrodisiac? Cheeto dust.

Tigers – Women who actually like sex. The dirty sluts.

Tiggers – The wonderful thing about Tiggers/Is Tiggers are wonderful things/Their tops are made out of rubber/Their bottoms are made out of springs/Also, they love to receive oral.

Vampyrictises – Women aged 14 to 49 who are totally on Team Edward. Or Team Jacob. Or Team Larry. (I haven’t actually read the books, and my daughter isn’t a tween yet; my knowledge of them comes from Burger King commercials.)

Wildcats – Ironically, wildcats are actually pretty calm most of the time, unless you get them started on how bad Two and a Half Men is. Do not get them started on how bad Two and a Half Men is. You will never hear the end of it. Trust me.

York Chocolate Cats – Actually applies to all women, because as we all know, all women love chocolate. And diamonds. And flowers. And whatever other little trinkets and baubles you can buy them to keep from having to actually talk to them.

So anyway, that’s the list as it stands today, although it could probably use expanding. I mean, there are always more cat names, and always more demeaning stereotypes that can be applied to women, so I’m sure we’ll come up with more. Until then, though, I hope this list allows you, the trend piece writer and misogynist (but I repeat myself) to write great columns for your local shoppers, explaining precisely why women suck. Because nothing proves women suck more than men stereotyping them.

So when we left off, I was talking about the fact that this god-awful article from the New York Observer started out talking about slut-shaming by giving an example of date rape. Now, I’m all in favor of shaming rapists, and if the article had been about calling out rapey behavior among women, I’d be happy to join in, although I’d probably point out that we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that female-on-male sexual assault occurs about one percent as often as male-on-female sexual assault, and indeed significantly less than male-on-male assault. Noting that a woman raping a man is a bad thing is not the same thing as saying men rape women, women rape men, and it’s all pretty balanced. It isn’t.

But Spencer Morgan’s article isn’t about attacking women for assaulting men. It’s about attacking women for having libidos — which is something very different. You see, the “cheetahs” that Morgan identify aren’t looking for a quick one-night stand. Oh, no. They’re looking to seduce men into long-term relationships by getting them into bed for a night. Or something. Really, the article is pretty incoherent. About the only thing that comes through loud and clear is that some women like pursuing men, and that’s bad.

Morgan jumps from Seth’s story to talk about women as species of cats, because that meme evidently hasn’t burned itself out yet. You may know about cougars — 40-something and older women who like sex — but cheetahs are their younger nieces, you see. They’re 25-somethings who like sex. This distinguishes them from pumas, who are 30-somethings who like to have sex with 20-something guys. (One might get the idea from this that women like sex. Hmmm. Nope, must be some feline metaphor I’m missing.)

At any rate, women like sex and actually sometimes seek out men to have one-night stands with. In the real world, this is called “dating,” and unlike the date-rapey behavior of Dana, it’s considered pretty normal. Or predatory:

I thought the same on a recent night here in New York, when my wife showed me a “funny” text one of her girlfriends sent her inquiring what she was up to—we were in a car, heading home—and sniggering that she herself was “out on the prowl.” I immediately thought of the widely held view that single women are keen to get their paws on a hunk of man to hunker down with for the winter months. I looked out the car window—it was raining. A cold, insinuating rain. The conditions were perfect for a cheetah to a strike.

Yes, strike with her vagina. Just like a cheetah, who, as we all know, is native to the New York area, and likes to strike in freezing rain.

Now, you might get the idea from this text that Morgan’s wife’s friend is a woman looking to hook up with a guy. On the contrary. She’s had her heart broken and stomped on, and is finding that love stinks, yeah yeah. At least, that’s what a cougar named Angela says:

She noted that her friend K.C. was a cheetah. Recently out of a relationship, K.C. has discovered that getting a man was no longer as easy as it once was. “It seems like whenever she can, she winds up going home with the drunkest guy in the bar,” said Angela. “Of course, in the back of her mind she’s hoping that her pussy’s still good enough to keep him.”

Because, you know, a woman never would look for a one-night stand. She has to get into a relationship. Any relationship. Especially with guys who have drinking problems:

A cock loiterer is typically a girl who has recently come out of a relationship that she’s been in for a long time, and she suddenly realizes that getting laid is not as easy as it once was,” [Deadspin writer A.J.] Daulerio explained. He noted that the cheetah hunts alone, and prefers gatherings where she can blend into the crowd until the quarry grow weak and sloppy. “You know, she’s the type who’ll come out to the sports bar for Sunday football and then, whereas most people will leave after the 12 o’clock game ends, she’ll stick around for the 4 o’clock game,” he said.

He added that the cheetah was not necessarily unattractive but that for some reason or another, she was not aware of her attractiveness. That said, the cheetah he had in mind was notorious for looking dreadful without her makeup on and, as with Dana, working her way through his friend group.

First off, once more, we have a nod and a wink to rapey behavior. But more to the point, we also have a direct shot at women. You see, the real failing of cheetahs is not that they like sex, or that they initiate it, but that they aren’t that hot anymore. Not hot enough, anyhow, to date hot guys.

And that’s what lies at the black, beating heart of this article: a huge lump of Schadenfreude. “Cheetahs” are too old to be having casual sex. At least with cute young guys. Serves ’em right, I guess, for having once been hot enough to. Or not — the article isn’t clear. At any rate, they should settle down, get married, aim for a less attractive man. And they’re never going to find it through sex.

“Women in New York tend to be at a huge disadvantage,” said John Carney, of Businessinsider.com and another cheetah victim, via Gchat. “Many moved here from elsewhere, severing the kind of social bonds that ordinarily would provide introductions to potential mates. The cheetah is an ill-conceived attempt to overcome this situation.” He added later: “It is tragic. They should put a warning in cabs, like they used to about seat belts and remembering to collect your belongings: ‘This random hook-up will not likely lead to a relationship. Please exit the cab with all your dignity.’”

The troubling thing about the cheetah is that it’s a lose-lose for both predator and prey. Both her Auntie Cougar and Cousin Puma have a certain dignity. They’re out there shakin’ it up, slaying dudes and taking names. Not so the cheetah, who hopes that her victim will find something in her searching eyes when he rolls over the next morning, and will try to subtly guilt him into another round next time they meet: “Hey, where’ve you been? I haven’t seen you in so long.”

You see, there’s no chance that she just wanted a night of sex. Women hate sex. They like relationships — even though these cheetahs seem to be “working their way through” every friend group in the world — which doesn’t sound like a woman looking for monogamy, now that I think about it.

At any rate, what would an article like this be without a paragraph that makes you want to bash your head against the wall?

Angela would like to do the cheetahs of the world a favor: “Heed my warning: You’re never going to get a boyfriend or a husband this way. Men like to chase. The only man you’ll ever get to stick around by being a cheetah is going to be a total pussy.”

And there we go: misogyny, misandry, misanthropy — whatever you want to call it, that reductive belief that human beings are incapable of making individual decisions, that men and women are of two separate, unrelated species that behave in easily-categorized ways, and that All Men behave in one way, and All Women behave in another.

Do some men like to chase? Yes. I’m not one of them. Chasing sucks. I’d rather be chased, myself, but alas, that doesn’t so much happen because women are always told that they’re supposed to sit back and be pursued.

The truth is that some men like to pursue, some like to be pursued. Some women like to pursue, some like to be pursued. And nobody likes to be taken advantage of. This is not rocket science. But it is too difficult for the New York Observer to grasp.