Like ePrize founder Josh Linkner, I’ve noticed magazine racks filled with Cosmo and Maxim and a zillion other periodicals forever offering 7-49,000 sex tips to drive your man/woman/whathaveyou wild.
But whereas when I read “advice” like: "feed each other ice cream [in the dark]. Not being able to see means more spilling, which means more licking up the mess" I wonder if the washing machine will get Cherry Garcia stains out of the sheets, Linkner sees an explanation for Detroit’s greatness.
He wrote about it in a Forbes piece entitled “What Works In The Bedroom Works In Detroit.”
Does Ralph Godbee have a favorite ice cream flavor. Too soon?
Anyway, let’s break down Linkner’s Detroit = Cosmo sex tips opus.
Hey good looking, Detroit is that ordinary guy that loves you for you
“Career-driven Midwesterners have flocked to the coasts, in the obvious trajectory for a pasture as green as they could imagine, and yet the new breed in Detroit is veering away from the herd. Options aren’t always as out in the open (nor are restaurant hotspots and lifestyle enclaves), but the less-obvious choices are here, and those taking advantage of them are thriving.”
Baby, Midtown will treat you right.
Things are always more fun without pants
“Business leaders here are dancing like nobody’s watching and telling the rest of the world to accept it and move on, or join in on the dance party. If all of our world business leaders felt this uninhibited in their companies, what could they accomplish?”
Tax abetments are the key parties of economic development.
Eve was a tomcat in the sack, so leaving Eden was totally worth it
“Taste the forbidden fruit. Sometimes, the best things in life are a little bit bad… Live a bit dangerously – feel how confident it makes you, your team, and your brand. After all, nothing is sexier than confidence.”
Another Godbee joke here seems too easy, but it's so tempting.
Be like Pepé Le Pew or that guy in that Every Breath You Take song
Boy meets girl in bar. Boy attempts small talk. Girl shuts down boy. Boy then sees girl again – and the bell rings for round two. Landing a date with her is (almost) as amazing as the date itself. The excitement building around the “hunt” is a true addiction.
You belong to me/why can't you see...
Make out in public, or at least ask people if they want to take your free personality test
“People in Detroit are simply evangelists – proud of their city, their companies and their peers’ efforts – and their passion is contagious. No different than the couple that takes its public displays of affection too far, making us wish they’d just get a room, this loudspeaker mentality obviously has its cutoff point. However, your enthusiasm gets others around you hyped up and motivated to make a difference, too. Share your zeal with the world.”
Don’t listen to the SPs. Being a Detroiter, when you drive past an accident, it’s not like anyone else. As you drive past, you know you have to do something about because you know you’re the only one who can really help.
Or maybe the lesson here is this: Once upon a time Cosmo was a respected literary magazine that published Hemingway and Dos Passos. And Detroit was the quintessential American city—architecture by Albert Kahn, Henry Ford re-inventing industry, world-class public culture. Now, both Detroit and Cosmo are now confusing eating desert in bed with getting lucky.
No, that's not right at all. Detroit is way cooler than Cosmo or Maxim or anything else sold in a grocery store checkout lane. The real lesson is the world would be a better place if people stopped pitching this motivational speaker horseshit. – JTW
