Yesterday, I was flipping through the latest issue of Maxim, and I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that, but I digress. I'm a sucker for "Top ___ of ____" lists, so I was curious to see the contents of their "1001 Sexist Women Ever" list. Of course, the existence (or proposal of the existence) of such a list is beyond preposterous. A real Top ___ Ever list should based on statistical methods (not flippant opinions) at least in some sense. Stated differently, trends should develop over time, with certain items settling into some sort of local minimum or maximum of the chart. A list of the greatest albums ever shouldn't, as of this week, contain seven REM records in its top ten just because they played a free show here in Toronto last week. Just because everyone's got a warm and fuzzy feeling in their bellies over REM doesn't mean they deserve to ride their hot streak into a Best of All Time List. Similarly, any list appearing in Maxim involving female celebrities is going to give precedence to the latest piece of hot T&A, with the odd Audrey Hepburn and Marilyn Monroe thrown in to make it look like someone actually did a bit of research. In twelve months, half the women in the top 50, say, wouldn't be there (if they did the list again).

A THOUSAND women. I couldn't even name two hundred women, let alone a thousand sexy ones. Half of them are easily replaceable in a year's time by newer, fresher T&A willing to bare their nipples through a see-through top in Maxim's glossy pages. Just think about this. What does it all mean? That's right, sexy women are EVERYWHERE. New ones are becoming pseudo-celebrities by the day. I can go out to any club on any night in the city of Toronto and see five gorgeous women that are sexier than the average woman on Maxim's list. I recalled Roger Ebert's comment on the Spice Girls, which stated, in essence, that they are no more beautiful than any random five young girls standing in line at a Dunkin Donuts. Ebert completely missed the point -- his dislike of the Spiceworld movie aside -- because the Spice Girls never claimed to be the sexiest women on the planet. But it's funny how superstardom leads to female celebrities being scrutinized as such. For every man or woman who pants over Ali Landry or Gisele Bunschen, there's an equal number who resent them because "they're not THAT pretty". So was the Spice Girls success just a massive fluke? Could any idiot have randomly picked five girls off the street and made them into superstars?

Would Titanic have been the same without Kate Winslett? If Kate Beckinsdale had played the part, would it have mattered?

Pick your favourite rock band. Suppose some random guy had played the bass instead of whoever they actually had. Would the band REALLY have turned out much different?