Prompt Images
In a quest to objectify even more objects, our staff has decided to rank their relative sexual attraction to three different kinds of trophies: sports trophies, literary trophies, and performance art trophies. Dennis William, N. Alysha Lewis, and Thomas Viehe give us the run-down.
Thomas Viehe: Performing Arts Trophies
7. The Golden Globes
Marble base. Fat orb on top. A film strip circling the world. I find curves sexy, but this trophy has too many edges for me to stay excited.
6. The Tony Award
When preparing to write this list, I had thought that the Tony Award was just a presentation of Tony Bennett. He would stand awkwardly on stage, comfortable in a tuxedo. He wouldn’t pull at the neckline or shift the weight between his feet. He would just look around, searching for his new master, waiting for his custody to be transferred.
He would glare at the announcer at the microphone, last year’s winner standing next to him, and that blasted spotlight that followed him everywhere. And then the name of his new guardian would be announced. The winner. He would open his mouth to show his teeth. White pearls. Sparkles of enamel. The smile would look more like a grimace, but no one would wonder if it wasn’t a smile. No one, except previous award winners. They would remember his agony and pain. That he was tired of being cycled around the award circuit. That he just wanted to go back to bed. That he really could still sing, you know, if given a microphone and some music. At a minimum, I thought winners got Neil Patrick Harris for a few months. That would be fun. But no, this is a coin that arouses nothing but sadness.
5. The Dundie Award
The man in the award leans to his right, shifting his weight away from the briefcase he’s been forced to carry all day. He keeps his suit on as he slouches into the booth at Chili’s. It’s been a long day, and he doesn’t care if he gets some barbecue sauce on his suit jacket. He got it for $50 at Kohl’s anyway. Such mediocrity is what I call “everyday sexy.” People in sweatshirts pulling their hair into ponytails, eating food that comes with a side of ranch.
4. The Emmy Award
Trace your finger from the base of this goddess’s feat to the atom in her hands. Let your finger wind around her torso, feel the edges of her electric wings as they come to a point. She can satisfy you in so many ways. Don’t be disappointed that the pinnacle of art and science has only brought us television. Without television we would not have dreams and old broadcasts of Star Wars and vision problems.
3. The Academy Award
The phallic posture of this golden statue has tempted even the most homophobic of men. I cannot help but wet my lips at the site of its shiny shaft, its bald head, its hands gripping that sword tighter than I feel comfortable imagining.
2. The Grammy Award
I first came across a gramophone when visiting a friend’s aunt for a weekend. The room smelled dusty and old. Like mothballs or Alzheimer’s. Bookshelves filled with stamped records stuffed in cardboard. Rugs thinning to rags. Wooden windows that had forgotten how to open. I avoided that room all weekend. It felt like the tomb of something sacred and I was afraid and ashamed by the temptation that pulled me: to stick my head inside its mouth. I still have that urge, some 20 years later, as I stare into the gilded, gaping cavity.
1. The MTV Video Music Award
The Moon Person is sexy and you know it. It’s the only androgynous award. Male, female, whatever. Everyone can imagine someone sexy in that suit, floating in space, one foot on the moon. Could it be Valentina Tereshkova? Sally Ride? Tracy Caldwell Dyson? It could be any of the powerful people that have represented our species to Outer Space. I think of Sandra Bullock on a space walk, Sigourney Weaver blowing the xenomorph out the airlock, Jodi Foster making contact, and Shizuka Hoshijiro floating weightless before her heartbreaking final battle. Who do you think stands in there, sucking on artificial air, forcing us to endeavor for greater things, even if it’s only a music video today?
Dennis William – Sports Trophies
9. Every Golf and Tennis Trophy
Sometimes when you win a golf or tennis tournament you get a bowl, sometimes you get a plate, sometimes it’s a jacket. Whichever it is, it’s a rococo snoozefest and I would not let it into my bed. Serena on the other hand…
8. Larry O’Brien Trophy (NBA Championship)
You wanna know how unfuckable the Larry O’Brien trophy is? I was about to submit this piece, but stopped myself when I realized that I hadn’t written section on the Larry O’Brien trophy. It looks like a novelty trash can.
In a sad attempt to compete with the Stanley Cup’s sordid past, the NBA championship trophy engaged in sexual congress with a team owner, but it was the lame-ass tech bro who owns the Warriors. Maybe if it hadn’t been such a prude and hooked up with an owner from the 70s or 80s, I could give it more credit.
7. Men’s World Cup
The Men’s World Cup trophy looks so crappy that I wasn’t sure which pictures were of the real trophy and which were of memorabilia replicas. The Men’s World Cup trophy looks like a cheap knock-off of itself. I figured the one with the FIFA World Football Museum was a safe bet.
You know what isn’t a safe bet? All the jagged edges on that trophy. Yikes. That thing looks like a claw made out of Han Solo trapped in carbonite. The font on the bottom looks slapdash. You would think that a trophy that is only awarded every 4 years would be a little more aesthetically-pleasing. Maybe use the off-years to gussy up this monstrosity. The one advantage it has over tennis and NCAA trophies is that it look interesting.
6. Vince Lombardi Trophy (NFL)
Stainless steel sex toys always seem the most intimidating. The stark metal seems very goth and impersonal. The Lombardi Trophy looks like a stainless steel butt plug or dildo. Maybe the most penis-esque of the sports trophies, but it is not sexy. It is boring and sterile JUST LIKE THE PATRIOTS! (Oh, that felt good).
5. WNBA Championship Trophy
The seemingly nameless WNBA championship trophy looks like Sputnik and a participation trophy had a baby. It is another styleless metallic ball on a pedestal. And yet it somehow gives me a bigger chub than its fellow clones from the NFL and NBA. Maybe it’s the use of negative space that adds the pizzazz.
4. Women’s World Cup
This is a legitimate good sports trophy. It’s not just some metal pedestal with the ball stuck on top. Artistic thought went into the design, which is why we have that spiraling ribbon of gold. Compared to the Men’s World Cup trophy this is Rihanna. I definitely want to wrap my hands around that shaft in a victorious exaltation.
3. The Commissioner’s Trophy (World Series/MLB Championship)
The baseball season is the sports equivalent of edging. It’s long and drawn out with many peaks and valleys. The initial excitement of Opening Day fades to the dog days of Summer. Then the hoopla of the midsummer classic that is the All-Star Game gets us riled up again. After that, the chaff is separated from the wheat.
Fading teams face their reality as the trade deadline approaches and become sellers. Those with a fighting chance become buyers looking to add talent to spice up their rosters. Fans become enthralled with the will they/won’t they excitement of the trade deadline. Once it passes, everyone settles in for the final push. We enter the playoff engorged with tension.
Each round offers a new plateau, with the victors popping champagne corks among their wild ululations. The Division Series, then the League Championship Series, each offering a feeling of relief and titillation that ultimately leaves us unfulfilled. That final expulsion of built up energy comes after 162 games, the Wildcard, LDS, LCS, and finally(!) the tipping point is the World Series. Some will tell you that baseball (and by association its trophy) isn’t sexy. They say it takes too long, there’s not enough action, it takes too long for the two biggest free agents in years to sign with a team. Well, those two-pump chumps are just jealous of the Sting-like tantra that is America’s pastime.
On top of the little death that is October baseball, there is the allure of the World Series trophy. The official moniker, the Commissioner’s Trophy, may not get anyone’s juices flowing, but the design will. It’s dainty yet dangerous. The spindle flag poles seem fragile, and yet they clearly could shank the life out of you. It is the femme fatale of sports hardware.
2. Olympic Medal
Every olympics has its own distinctive medal. When you win one, it’s special and you get to keep it forever (depending on your personal finances). And we all want to feel special, whether we celebrating a win or getting it in.
The fact that this is a wearable trophy really catapulted it up the list. All of the other trophies can be nearby or involved in some rubbing, but only an Olympic medal can be worn while boning. Hell, the medal from the Vancouver games even has a hole in it incase that’s what you want to bone.
Magnificent. That is an apex predator’s cock ring.
Even if you aim to go the obvious route and wear the medal, the prospect of that cold disc slapping your chest while you grind on some strange holds an irresistible pull.
1. Stanley Cup (NHL)
Remember how earlier I said that the Lombardi Trophy looked like a stainless steel buttplug? Well, this legitimately looks like the Stanley Cup. Anyway, the Stanley Cup is the best. It likes to party. It has a great history and persona. You don’t get to touch it until you win it, which brings some D/S energy to the relationship (or chastity play if you prefer). And when you win it, they put your name on it.
I’ve got a metaphor, but pardon me while the pronouns get clunky. The Stanley Cup is the summer fling that ushers you into adulthood. They’re fun, and, even though you know that your time with them has to end, their experience somehow gives you the confidence to face all of the inevitable losses that life will bring you on your pursuit of the next championship.
On a very real note, the Stanley Cup has probably been involved in more sex acts than you or I have. It is by far the most experienced of any trophy on this list.
N. Alysha Lewis: Literary Trophies
7. (tie) Pulitzer Prize in Fiction / Nobel Prize in Literature
Were you aware that a lot of literary awards are just medals? How lame is that? It seems like putting the least amount of effort into giving someone props; “Here’s a abnormally large coin. Enjoy.” For how important (read: pretentious) these honorariums are, you’d think they’d put a LITTLE effort into making them sexier.
These are the Ivy Leagues of sex partners; they coast on the wave of their own desirability and don’t actually bring anything to the table once you’re getting down. But, hey: at least you can say you’ve been there.
6. Nebula Award
I don’t care for this . . . It’s so rectangular. At times, it’s thicker than a soda can. That is not a sexy combination. It looks painful. And not in a “Mr. Gray will see you now” kind of way. In like a “DIY episiotomy” way.
Pass.
5. The National Book Award
THIS. IS. SCARY.
Is this what Sauron’s dick looks like? Or the Witch King’s? Is it going to whisper to me how “no man” can kill it, which would ruin the vibe for so many reasons. (Is it bisexual? Is it aggressively heterosexual? Is it just trying to acknowledge how much it looks like the kind of sex toy JRRT would’ve written into the series or, at the very least, almost certainly planned?)
I don’t like this. It’s protruding in all the wrong ways, and it looks sharp. To be into this, you gotta be on some truly hardcore BDSM shit. And that ain’t me, fam. That ain’t me.
4. The Academy of Science Fiction Saturn Award
Okay. We’re trying something new here. I respect that. The top has a very clear butt plug look about it; if you snapped it off at the base, you’d have a pretty decent dildo. The rings of this golden Saturn also provide a nice stopping point from either side of things, so it’s letting you get freaky but not TOO freaky.
Starter kink, if you will. I’d need to be just a skosh drunk to try this out, but I’m not entirely against it.
3. The British Book Award
This is cute! Its smooth, concave slope from the midpoint to the tip are inviting. Makes it look like it’d slide right on in. The pointiness at the bottom of the slope gives me pause; this is obviously something you don’t want just jamming away in your bits, like a glitzy jackhammer. No, this is a nice, chill fuck. I think this would be the literary award equivalent of having sex with Colin Firth. Intriguingly gentle, but it might have a surprise or two in store.
2. The Man Booker Award
I’m gonna be honest. I can’t explain to you why this one is so high on the list. It’s weird as hell. But, I’m very intrigued just by the thought of trying to figure out HOW it would work. Would you put the little handle-looking bit in your chacha, leaving the chunky square part to play DJ Diddles? That could be surprisingly fun! And even failing to fuck wouldn’t be so bad; at least it wouldn’t positively wreck your insides like some of the other entrants.
1. The Hugo Award
Do I even need to say anything here?
I didn’t think so.
(And if they didn’t do this shit on purpose, I will eat a bowl of mayonnaise.)
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