Many Such Takes: Date Feedback, Sydney Sweeney's Waist, Albanian Eric Adams, and More

The most unhinged discourse of the week, always free

Welcome to Many Such Takes! For those unfamiliar, this is a free weekly segment (I also do lots of other stuff—you can typically expect 4-5 paid posts a week too!) For Many Such Takes, I stay up to date with the latest and most chaotic Twitter discourse so you don’t have to.

Also, in case you’re thinking of upgrading to paid, you will get access to CHH CHAT, a chat channel on Substack full of men, women, and people of different political affiliations and sexual orientations who manage to discuss hot topics like sex, dating, parenting, or even politics without killing each other. Join us!!

Also, while you are here, please fill out my latest survey on infidelity, loyalty and monogamy. You do not have to have cheated or been cheated on to fill it out, but if you have experienced either of these things you will be extra helpful!

Albanian Eric Adams

We all know Eric Adams loves to say that New York City is the (insert city here) of America. It seems, in fact, that New York City is the Istanbul of America, the Athens of America, and the Seoul of America, among other things. Given Eric Adam’s love of the clitoris, one might argue that New York City is also the clitoris of America (it literally is.)

But no nation has gripped Eric’s Adam’s passion as much as Albania, where he just became a citizen. We have met Eric Adams at a very…Albanian time in his life:

He apparently visited Albania before, where he declared that NY was—you guessed it—the Albania of America. (I don’t want to be pedantic here, but Albania is not in America, so for the metaphor to make sense, New York City would have to be the Tirana of America. But I digress.)

But the big question: WHY? Well, Twitter has some ideas:

The best explanation is that Eric Adams has simply been obsessed with Albania for a while. I can’t say I’ve ever seen the word “albaniaboo” before this but…I’m obsessed.

Sydney Sweeney’s Waist

While I’m no stranger to talking about body shape in a way that reads as callous or geeky, this week Twitter really took it to a new level when Sydney Sweeney was body shamed for being too “rectangular.”

OP says she wasn’t hating, and just acknowledging that Sweeney is often wearing a corset to hide a straighter waist shape, which looks fine without shapewear too.

While the original post was probably meant to be a a bit of a jab (or was it? I honestly can’t tell) a lot of the comments were confused, given that Syndey Sweeney is thin. Sadly, I knew exactly what she was talking about because I spend way too much time thinking about this stuff—Syndey Sweeney has a body shape common in many thin women with naturally big chests (see: model Kate Upton) where most of the weight is gained on the upper body (the opposite of a pear shape) and the waist is less defined, even when thin. Commonly known as a “V” shape. But more importantly: this isn’t unusual, and having a straight-shaped waist is incredibly common even without big boobs. A lot of people truly seem to think your average woman would look like a Brazilian Instagram model if she was at an ideal weight. I wrote about this too—the average white woman is not “curvy” (re: waist definition) no matter what her weight is.

Of course, there’s always one person who needs to use this as a jumping point to brag. Yes, I have the perfect body. I exist. Don’t erase me <3

People got so scientific with it that I thought there was transvestigation afoot:

Anyway, given that last year I saw a post making fun of peak ‘00s Halle Berry for being “rectangular,” I maintain that even more than weight, our waist/curve obsession is getting out of hand:

Date Feedback

In case you thought being ghosted was the worst way for a date to end, you haven’t gone on a date with this guy yet, who informed a woman that he didn’t find her attractive and that she needed to go to therapy to do some inner work—and I feel like that description is not doing justice to how unpleasant such a message would be. And they say chivalry is dead!

The denizens of Twitter were not amused:

However, let’s give him the benefit of the doubt. Upon hearing more context, it sounds like his date went so badly that we can at least understand where he was coming from. A woman who bursts into tears on a date (assuming this is actually true) probably does need to do inner work.

I maintain the text and the decision to post it were #weird, which actually has me wondering if they’re a better match for each other than OP believes.

Meanwhile, elsewhere on Twitter, this girl is getting the reverse treatment:

Microdrama: Illegal Shoes

If you thought women’s fashion was restrictive, take a look at men’s—every day I’m learning about a new fashion faux pas that millions of men are unwittingly committing. Today, it’s light warm brown dress shoes:

And whatever, whatever you do, don’t get the ones with a sneaker sole. This one I understand.

OP clarified that the issue is with shoes that are “too orange-toned,” and not all light brown shoes. Luckily Menswear Guy was there to clarify:

Funny Tweets/Other Happenings

I can’t explain why I laughed out loud at this one, but I did:

This poor unfortunate Spongebob plush:

An interesting female dating strategy:

In case you missed it…