Why you don't have a job.

The Fairy Jobmother and Downsized, by Todd VanDerWerff, The A.V. Club.

Report: Unemployment High Because People Keep Blowing Their Job Interviews, The Onion.

According to the findings, seven out of 10 Americans could have landed their dream job last month if they had known where they see themselves in five years, and the number of unemployed could be reduced from 14.6 million to 5 million if everyone simply greeted potential employers with firmer handshakes, maintained eye contact, and stopped fiddling with their hair and face so much.

[ . . . ]

"If applicants would just say yes when asked if they played softball or liked golf, we could add 350,000 jobs to the private sector," Deputy Labor Secretary Seth Harris said. "The fact is, right now, today, approximately a third of the country's manufacturing positions are vacant. Auto plants across the country, especially in Detroit, are sitting there just waiting for people to come in and build cars."

"You may be a qualified candidate, but none of that matters if you walk into that interview lacking confidence," he added. "Don't act too confident, though. And don't joke around too much. And don't be overly friendly or ask too many questions. But be yourself."

If only you knew how to shake hands, you'd be running the company.

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Manic Pixie Dream Girl

or, more on my discontent with Summer (see what I did there?).

For the titular reference, you can read Wild things: 16 films featuring Manic Pixie Dream Girls, by Amelie Gillette, Donna Bowman, et al, at the A.V. Club.

Onto the articles about the movie:

Indie Movies Can Be Sexist, Too, by Sarah Seltzer, RH RealityCheck.

Indie Dream Girls, by Doree Shafrir, The Daily Beast.

Manic Pixie Dream Girls, the Santa Claus of romantic comedies, by Amanda Marcotte, pandagon.net.

500 Days of He's Just Not That Into You, by Willa Paskin, Double X.

Previews: "500 Days of Summer" and "Paper Heart", by Alyx Vesey, Feminist Music Geek.

(500) Days of Summer, by Marc Webb, MovieMartyr.com.

From the comment section under information addict's post:

I am so sick of things written from a guy’s perspective that don’t acknolwedge that maybe the girl has her own desires, and they don’t include being with the guy, and that doesn’t make her a bitch or unfeeling or cold. It just makes her a person.

From the comment section under An Open Letter to Zooey Deschanel’s Male Admirers, by Pilgrim Soul, The Pursuit of Harpyness:

The idolizing of the quirky girl grates on me–Zoe and her ilk seem so intentionally precious and affected–but overall it fails to ignite my howling feminist rage the way the worship cute-but-dumb girls does (Jessica Simpson, Kendra, Paris, Daisy, LC, Heidi, etc).


If dudes pick Zoe and her ilk over the dumb blondes, well, that’s the lesser of the two evils, IMO. The real problem is that our media/film culture doesn’t offer them anything better or more realistic.

See. I'm not the only one involved in the hateration. Other people let that hate (or, constructive criticism) out, too, as we all should.

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