So it’s our Last Dance with Dear Sonny & Cher from 16 Magazine. How bittersweet. Fourteen installments (that we know of) and we’ve learned a lot. Or at least I have.
And I have looked high and low for a better copy of this photograph, which cuts off the first question to Cher and, like the last column, some of the words at the far right. But I think we can piece together the idea of most of it.
In this last photo, Sonny and Cher wear shinny shirts and you can see Cher’s big rings. Not a particularly flattering picture of either of them but that’s part of their casual vibe, I guess.
If your young life is full of problems there’s no need for you to suffer alone. In fact, there’s no need for you to suffer at all. Cher—and Sonny—want to help you—right here in the pages of 16!
Sonny and I are back again, reading your letters, answering as many as possible, and (hopefully) helping you to solve the problems you encounter in your day-to-day life. If your letter is not here, please don’t feel neglected—there just is not enough room in 16 to answer all of the many letters we get every month. Sonny and I carefully select a cross-section of the mail that represents your most important problems. If your questions aren’t answered this month. please come back next month—for sooner or later you will find your problem and our advice right here in 16 Magazine.
Dear Cher, [Question Missing]
Cher’s Response:
Dear Overweight, First, you should have a simple physical checkup by your family M.D., just to make sure that you do not have a thyroid problem (or any other condition). Your problem is probably just that you [overeat]. That normally is the problem with people who are too fat. On the righthand page you will see an ad for 16’s Popularity & Beauty Book. This booklet is a gem of information for “fatties.” I suggest that you try it. Good luck!
Cher Scholar’s Response:
Ok, I really hope this person self-referred as a “fatty” in their letter and this is why we find this word is in quotes. Secondly, a booklet? I’ve been looking for a booklet? For the love of… The rip-off smell is getting stronger in here.
Maybe this person just has thyroid problem. But this also reminds me of the very funny “glandular problem” bit on Family Guy. There’s plenty of medical conditions to screw around with our weight: thyroid problems, menopausal problems, some antidepressants, steroids and some blood pressure and diabetes medications can cause problems.
This isn’t the only question we’ve seen on weight issues. This series often seems to be repeating itself for all the disclaimers about hand-picking unique issues from the bulk of letters coming in.
If I think back on all the come-and-gone medical solutions to weight issues over the years given to people I know, it’s disheartening: liposuction, testosterone patches, stomach bands, remember those weird fat-jiggling machines people thought were exercise? Here’s a funny piece about a woman who tested one out in 2016.
If I ever meet Neil deGrasse Tyson, I am going to ask him straight out if he thinks nutrition is still a frontier science. I’m convinced it is.
Anyway, it’s not PC to call people fatties or fatsos anymore. Just a heads up if you hadn’t heard. The old Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour had some fat-suit skits that are now equally problematic, but also still funny. (If you can find them.) People who watched the show remember one of the memes of the skits where a fat-suit character would say a metaphorical food word, like “easy as pie” or “pie in the sky” and the other characters would rub their hands together and say excitedly, “pie!”
Even pictures online are scarce. Here is a picture from the first one, a skit called Detective Fat which made fun of the show Cannon with William Conrad. They also had Jim Neighbors as a guest once and they spoofed Gunsmoke.
Dear Cher, At what age do you think a girl should start dating? Also, [do] boys really prefer girls who play hard to get more than girls who flirt with them? Why are the flirts the first to get the dates? Questions, Cedar Rapids, Iowa
Cher’s Response:
Dear Questions, I think 14 is the proper age for a girl to start double-dating. The dates should be for dances and public affairs only. My little sister “Gee,” who is 14 goes to community center parties and chaperoned dances [unreadable] dates. I think that guys like a girl who is a [unreadable] flirt and hard to get. Don’t go overboard in either direction, and remember this: it isn’t the girl who gets the first date that matters, it’s the one who gets the second, third, fourth and fifth. I hope you are that one.
Cher’s Scholar’s Response:
What about the sixth date? And the seventh? And ugh…what kind of flirt should this girl be? What is the missing word?? That’s a crucial adjective we’re missing there! And this could very well be the one single word that could have changed me from a bad flirt into a good flirt!
(And I think we can all agree that if I was a better flirt I wouldn’t have said half the things I’ve said in this whole series of Cher Scholar responses. But then I’m also not qualified to answer any of these questions.)
Anyway, Gee is Georganne, Cher’s beautiful, blonde sister who I’m sure had the pick of many offered dates. Especially being able to says she was Cher’s little sister.
More on this later but playing hard to get is basically a pre-dating game. How long does one have to keep that up? Some people play this game long into a relationship. (I’m thinking of a scene from When a Man Loves a Woman where Meg Ryan and Andy Garcia, long married, go to public places and pretend they don’t know each other to keep their relationship feeling fresh.) There’s also playful fighting that is a kind of flirting. But those games seem safer in a situation where people know each other well. Then again there are plenty of people who would be bored without the chase, people for whom the chase is the point. Then there are other people who see game-playing as an impediment to intimacy.
My theory is the more sensitive a person is, (and sensitivity is a superpower, remember), the less these games might appeal to them. It’s like how spicy foods are explained in the book How Pleasure Works by Paul Bloom. People who have more taste buds on their tongue (not hereditary just randomly), enjoy spicy foods a lot less because the taste is overwhelming on a tongue with more taste buds. (I must have zero taste buds in this scenario.) Those people, turns out, aren’t “picky,” as I was always taught to label such people. They actually have smarter tongues, if you think about it. And therefore, they would rather have calmer food.
And speaking of chaperones, Cher was out of the house at 16. Her mother was working and she was probably dating before that even, unchaperoned. Her time with Warren Beatty was famously unchaperoned. Who knows who else she ran into like that unchaperoned. Because Warren Beattys were like rats in the 1960s. If you saw one, there was probably 50 more running around within 50 yards of you. (Oh dear. I’ll probably run into trouble with that joke.)
Anyway, the tension around flirt or play-hard-to-get continues in the next question and we’ll pick it up again there.
Here’s a fake mugshot photo of the unchaperoned Cher.
Dear Sonny, I am a guy who is [13, 15?], and there’s a girl down the street I’m crazy about. She is also in my room at school. She used to like me, but now she doesn’t. What should I do about this problem? Love-sick, Chicago, Ill.
Sonny’s Response:
Dear Love-sick, The worst thing a guy (or girl) can do when someone they like ignores them is to start chasing after that person. They become a nuisance, aside from which the chick realizes she’s got you [unreadable] and there isn’t any excitement or intrigue left. The only chance [you] have is to become a challenge to this girl. Somehow, make your[self] interesting to her and then play hard to get. Don’t be at her beck and call. Let her wonder what happened. She will either [come] around or not, and if not, she’s really not for you. The first [step] towards maturity is to learn to accept the facts of life. It’s like [unreadable] buddy—what is is.
Cher Scholar’s Response:
I’m sorry. Did I say last week’s Sonny answer on football was the worst advice I have ever heard in my life? I was wrong. This is the worst advice I’ve ever heard in my life.
She’s got you [something]? She’s got you covered? Hornswoggled? Snickerdoodled? Boobytrapped? She’s got you where she wants you? What?
Not to mention that this advice conflicts with previous Cher advise on chasing versus fighting-for and we’re back in the perpetual mess of what to do.
Play the game, don’t play the game. It all comes down to the power-structure. Who is having to work hard at performing the appropriate level of availability around which people (and their level of social power) and at what times in history and with the understanding of which consequences? Because both parties aren’t being offered the same power. It’s not healthy if one person is doing the playing for another person and the person being played to has full control of the relationship. It’s not true intimacy because one person has to hold back or release honesty only in particularly acceptable moments. You can’t be yourself and do this.
If it’s a truly equitable game, meaning both parties trade off the power position, this would seem okay. But I don’t often see that. I see one party (and this could be the boy, the girl, anybody) at a disadvantage.
But even saying that, some people are turned on by that disadvantage and that’s what they’re working out in this lifetime. And that’s them doing them.
How do you know if you’re engaging in power plays? Look at how you treat your friends. Do you treat your lovers with the same amount of respect and give them the same amount of agency? Intimate relationships should work the same way (just with extra benefits). Surely, they shouldn’t be treated worse.
And speaking of relationships, since this is our last question about boys and dating and this has been such an overwhelmingly big theme in this column, let’s finish up on the whole topic with a very problematic Cher song lyric and, ironically, a very astute Sonny one.
This 1979 Cher song, “Boys and Girls,” is from her album Prisoner. It was written by Billy Falcon. To give this song some context, this was when Cher was on the Casablanca label and struggling to introduce some rock music into what was meant to be another disco album. This song suffers from that tug of war.
The lyrics also attempt to take us through the somewhat rough experience of flirting.
Boys, go and shine up your shoes
Girls, run and powder your nose
‘Cause tonight you’ll be shaking
From your head down to your toesWell feeling you’re cool is as good as looking it
Thinking you’re cool is as good as knowing it
Playing it cool is as good as blowing it[I would argue that feeling you’re cool is NOT as good as looking it.]
You know you can’t spend a dollar, if you ain’t got a dime
You can’t hook a fish if you ain’t got a line
You won’t catch the bus if you’re not there on time[Hard to argue with any of these statements.]
So go read up your books and sharpen your hooks
Then all you need is money and a mouth full of honey
And if you play your cards right after dancing all night
You won’t have to walk home alone
I said, you won’t have to walk home aloneBoys, you can hang loose and slip up real cool
But if your lady has a love noose she might never let you go[Love noose?! Ok, now that’s scary.]
And if you think maybe you’re too young
And you just cannot cope, just grab a razor sharp
Pair of cutting shears and cut a hole right in the rope
Snip a hole right in the rope[Razor sharp pair of cutting shears. Very specific. Scissors are not good enough to extricate yourself from the love noose. Noted.]
Boys, go and shine up your shoes
Girls, run and powder your nose
‘Cause tonight you’ll be shaking
From your head down to your toesWell feeling you’re cool is as good as looking it
Thinking you’re cool is as good as knowing it
Playing it cool is as good as blowing it
You know you can’t spend a dollar, if you ain’t got a dime
You can’t hook a fish if you ain’t got a line
You won’t catch the bus if you’re not there on timeWell if you wake up tomorrow morning
And you can’t remember what you did
Just ring up some of your friends
And they’ll tell you just how low you slid
Oh don’t be ashamed of anything you hear
After all you can’t be blamed when you’re drinking so much beer[Just how much beer can we picture Cher drinking?]
Hey, don’t worry that what you did just wasn’t right
Just remember, brothers and sisters
After every day’s another night
Just remember, brothers and sisters
After every day’s another night[Truth, Days do indeed follow nights.]
Boys, go and shine up your shoes
Girls, run and powder your nose
‘Cause tonight you’ll be shaking
From your head down to your toes
I said, boys, go and shine up your shoes
Girls, run and powder your nose
‘Cause tonight you’ll be shaking
From your head down to your toesBoys, go and shine up your shoes
Girls, run and powder your nose
‘Cause tonight you’ll be shaking
Oh, from your head down to your toes
Boys, go and shine up your shoes
Girls, run and powder your nose
‘Cause tonight you’ll be shaking
From your head down to your little bitty toes
I really miss liner notes. Cher’s album Prisoner was the first Cher album to have them.
But this all seems very bleak to me. Even the music makes me feel tense. And there’s a lot more to shining shoes and powdering noses than is explained here. It sounds oppressive, overly complicated and, quite frankly, an emotional quagmire.
Sonny’s answers have been hot and cold in this series, giving both fair and completely sexist advice. But sometimes he could be very sensible and helpful and simple. When conditions were right, I guess. (When the light of the moon hits the keyhole on the first month of December…) Of all the issues in all these columns about love relationships, I believe the answer can be found in this little, unassuming line from my very favorite (Sonny &) Cher song, written by Sonny, “Somebody.”
“It aint power. It aint freedom.”
If you have relationship problems, the issue probably lies with one of these mindsets. And if you can figure your way out of these mindsets, you’re pretty much home free. We’re all indoctrinated to want to control (or be controlled), to escape (or be discovered), as if that’s all there is to it.
But in an ironic twist provided by Sonny himself, relationships are so much more beautifully complicated than power and freedom or “Boys and Girls.” The problem may be simple and static, but a good result is an amazingly intricate variability.
It aint power. It aint freedom.
Dear Sonny, I am 14 years old and there’s a guy I’m really gone on, but [he] doesn’t know that I like him. My mother heard me talking to [unreadable] on the phone and got mad. She says that I should not like boys [four] or five years older than I am. I stopped talking to this boy [unreadable] missed him very much. Then last week we started talking [unreadable]. Now, I think he is in love with one of my best friends. [What] should I do? Mixed-up, Santa Barbara, Calif.
Sonny’s Response:
Dear Mixed-Up, Some parents are more old-fashioned than others, and the problem can become difficult. As you know, I am older than Cher [unreadable] at first her parents did not take to me. Fortunately, I proved [unreadable] worthy of their daughter. Since this guy you dig seems [hung up on?] another girl, why don’t you just determinedly make yourself new friends. When you do, introduce them to your mom, so [that she] can see that they are nice folks—no matter how much [younger? or] how much older they are than you. Wish you happiness!
Cher Scholar’s Response:
A boy she is really “gone on.” Now that’s an interesting way to say it. She’s lost herself. She’s gone. Sonny says “parents” here but in the stories it’s only Cher’s mother who was upset about the 11-year age difference between Cher and Sonny. But now I wonder who Georgia was with at this time. Was she married at that time? I don’t think Cher’s father was involved at all, quite possibly he was in prison.
Anyway, this is good advice, Sonny. And this was a good question to end on. And a great farewell to our series with the final “Wish you happiness.”
Here is a picture of Sonny & Cher being groovy to see us off. Sonny is wearing his El Primo shirt. Good grief! Well, as they say, fuck around and find out.
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