Hissyfit

Imagine that a magazine called Mindless Celebrity Worship hit the stands, but it had exactly the same content as People. You might be more likely to pick it up, but how long would it really hold your attention? Or, how about a publication called Soft Porn Posing as Rock Criticism with the same content as Rolling Stone? You get the idea. Giving one's publication a cute, self-deprecating title does not make it immune to criticism. A point that seems at times to have been lost on the creators of Hissyfit.

Hissyfit is run by a husband and wife who go by the aliases Glark and Wing Chun, respectively. Most of the contributors are women (although they use aliases too), and its articles are generally written from a feminist perspective when relevant. However, it's not really a "for women" site like most of the other Chickclick affiliates. So what is its focus? Wing Chun explains in an abcnews.com interview (yes, Hissyfit's gotten a fair amount of publicity): "I guess it's like the name says. It's a rant site. Is that a mission?" Well, not really.

If Hissyfit does have a focus, it's pop culture. Wing Chun's no-holds-barred attack on Esquire's Women We Love Issue is an example of the Hissyfit esthetic at its best. Slashing at Esquire's insouciant sexism and sloppy writing, she hits her mark more often than not, even prompting one of the writers to respond: "If you ever wish to give me an opportunity to respond to your criticism, perhaps I would."

Unfortunately, not all of its pop culture criticism is quite as on-target. Contributor Lise's recent dissection of this summer's films ends up being little more than a months-tardy distillation of conventional movie wisdom. We learn that Wild Wild West wasn't such a great movie (at least from what she heard), South Park was "subversive," the Blair Witch Project was overhyped, and Eyes Wide Shut was "totally insane."

At least the pop culture criticism has some crossover appeal — "crossover appeal," in this context, means, "appeal that extends beyond the writer." In the past month, Hissyfit has seen fit to publish articles on how annoying it is when one's two dogs insist on mating, how exasperating it is when people monopolize the handicapped stall in a public restroom, and how infuriating San Francisco drivers can be. If you're looking for an overarching social context, forget about it. This is confessional prose for the writer who has nothing to confess.

It's not surprising that Hissyfit's style works best in a more conversational format. Its forums, moderated attentively if often heavy-handedly, are populated by male and female twentysomethings whose wry observations are worth reading even for a non-participant. Just small and intimate enough to be a genuine online community, the Hissyfit forums are one of the only places on the Web where you can intelligently discuss topics from HTML-purist "Notepad Nazis" to "'Desperately Seeking Hatsumomo,' Madonna as Geisha."

So, while you're certainly "entitled to [Wing Chun and Glark's] opinion," you might get more mileage out of posting your own. But don't tell them that — they might have a...well, you know.

— Julia Lipman (julia@flakmag.com)