Torrent Magazine on Twitter!

For the sake of disentangling Torrent Magazine’s online presence from my own, Torrent Magazine now has its own Twitter handle.

Yay! Please follow.

– Shiyuan

Preventing Assault Isn’t Just Women’s Work

This happened a lot when I was at Scripps.

Some girl would get assaulted after a wild night at CMC or Harvey Mudd, and the next week would see, as predictable as clockwork, a whole slew of articles on what women can do to keep themselves safe.

Annie Le wrote one of these herself, a few months before her body was found stuffed into a wall.

Never go out alone. Take a friend with you. Check in with each other frequently throughout the night.

Watch your drink. It’s easy to slip something in if you’re not paying attention.

In fact, maybe you shouldn’t drink at all. Well – one or two is fine. But more than that, and you’re just asking for trouble.

Always leave the party. Don’t ever lie down. Once you lie down, it’s all over. Next thing you know, it’s the next morning & your head is woozy & you can’t for the life of you remember what happened the night before.

Don’t walk near tall bushes. Assailants like to use them for cover. They hide & wait for you to walk along, drunk from your too many drinks, and then they get you. Yeah, that’s how they get you.

I read those articles, and I read the articles about Annie Le, and I wonder why they’re all so focused on what women can do about the problem of assault & sexual assault. Why aren’t we talking about what men can do about assault? (Namely – stop committing them & stop rationalizing away your friends’ acts of violence).

Women & Money Series: A Budget You Can Stick To

Meet Nary Mary.

Nary Mary: HI EVERYONE!

Nary Mary is the whiny, pesky, rationalizing, justifying, oh-so-convincing voice in all of us that encourages our feel-good spending, discourages our feeble attempts at financial planning, and enables our bad lifestyle habits.

Nary Marys tend to rear their ugly heads just as we’ve finally made the commitment to be serious about our money. Financial planning is one of those things – like exercising – that causes immediate pain without offering us an immediate pay off in return. That’s the perfect environment for a Nary Mary.

Example:

Nary Mary: You don’t have to work out tonight. It’s 10pm. You’ve had a long day. You can always go tomorrow.

Nary Mary: Sure, that pair of shoes is expensive. But it’s ON SALE. Think of how much you are SAVING by not buying it at the original price! Looks like a steal to me.

Nary Mary: You don’t need a budget. You’re already saving more than your friends. Besides, you’re only 23 years old. You’ve got a long way to go before you have to think about retirement. Hey, look! Gossip Girl season premier is on TV. Don’t you have some ice cream in the fridge? Mmm, chocolate.

You get the point.

This “Effortless Chic” Business

Be Chic columnist Fiona

Happy Friday, folks.

I’m excited to introduce Fiona, our new fashion & style columnist!

She’s stylish, resourceful, and sassy as all heck. I hope you will enjoy reading her column as much as we do.

– Shiyuan

(PS. Isn’t she SO FREAKING CUTE? I know, I can’t handle it either.)

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Chic. What does THAT mean?

Well, we know what it means to Vogue:

Immaculately dressed men and women. In man form, think Don Draper from “Mad Men.” In woman form, it is, of course, Audrey Hepburn.

Handed down to us lowly mortals from Fashion Magazines, “chic” is often a look that’s presented in ways that only seem replicable with unlimited money and unhampered access.

For the everyday woman, that’s all but impossible. Right?

Wrong.

Girl Held Captive as Sex Slave for 18 Years

Young Jaycee Dugard

You can’t make this stuff up.

Eighteen years ago, Philip Garrido & his wife, Nancy Garrido, abducted then 11-year old Jaycee Dugard from a bus stop in South Lake Tahoe, Nevada. The Garridos brought Jaycee Dugard back to their house in Antioch, CA, where she was kept in a makeshift backyard compound, repeatedly raped, & forced to bear two children with Phillip Garrido, the first of which she had when she was only 14 years old.

As details about this bizarre story surface in the media, it’s all I can do to shake off my disbelief.