United States Department of State via Wikimedia Commons This week, the nation’s two largest reproductive rights advocacy groups endorsed Hillary Clinton for president. Planned Parenthood Action and NARAL Pro-Choice America came out with public endorsements, in what’s a bit of a shake-up for both organizations—though arguably most pointedly in the case of Planned Parenthood, which […]
Girls Only!
Posted inMovies & TV
Maybe Let’s Not Banish Girls into Marriage-Slavery?
MUSTANG Turkey! It’s maaaaybe not the best place to be a little girl. Turkish director Deniz Gamze Ergüven’s Mustang is about the ways patriarchy oppresses women. It’s set in Turkey, but the specific cultural context matters less than the general one: It could take place in any country or historical era where women’s access to […]
Posted inMovies & TV
If This Is What Pandering to Feminists Looks Like, Maybe David O. Russell Should Do It More Often
JOY Hooray! Jennifer Lawrence saves Christmas! “History is a commentary on the various and continuing incapabilities of men. What is history? History is women following behind with a bucket.” That’s from Alan Bennett’s play The History Boys, not David O. Russell’s new movie, Joy. Russell’s opening epigraph is decidedly more optimistic and banal (it helpfully […]
Posted inGirls Only!
In a Classic Case of Too Little, Too Late, Game of Thrones Will Tone Down Its Gender-Based Violence
Eva Rinaldi via Wikimedia Commons Looks like Rape of Thrones Game of Thrones may be changing its horrible, horrible tune. Here’s Jezebel: Whether or not you watched the fifth season of Game of Thrones, you likely caught wind of the controversy surrounding its especially gratuitous violence against women. Even fans of the show condemned certain […]
Posted inPolitics
Here Are the Worst Parts of the UN’s Report on Discrimination Against Women in the United States
Last week, a United Nations working group released a report on discrimination against women in the US. Much of the coverage since has skimmed off the top, so I decided to read the whole report, taking a highlighter to it, and thinking to myself, “Well, gee, I’ll just highlight the most egregious parts.” Oh, how […]
Posted inPolitics
Senate GOP Votes to Defund Planned Parenthood, Reject Gun Control
Charlotte Cooper via Wikimedia Commons Wow, Senate Republicans really know who the real enemy is: While taking the thoughts ‘n’ prayers approach to preventing domestic terrorism this week, they put on their big-kid pants yesterday in a party-line vote for a budget that would defund Planned Parenthood and repeal the Affordable Care Act, but opted […]
Posted inPolitics
Sorry, Fox News. Pretty Sure Domestic Terrorism Was Already Political.
Fox News In the wake of Friday’s awful shooting at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado, Fox News and the clown car of GOP presidential hopefuls are trotting out that tired accusation we hear every time there’s a mass shooting: The left-wing establishment/Planned Parenthood/liberal media is politicizing a tragedy. The implication, of course, is that […]
Posted inBooks
Claire Vaye Watkins Just Said Everything I’ve Ever Wanted to Say About Sexism in Publishing
Riverhead Books At our own Tin House, the author of Gold Fame Citrus takes on internalized sexism in the world of publishing: The stunning truth is that I am asking, deep down, as I write, What would Philip Roth think of this? What would Jonathan Franzen think of this? When the answer is probably: nothing. […]
Posted inPolitics
Women in Texas are Inducing Their Abortions Themselves
via Thinkstock You know, unless you’re a woman. Fuck this week, man. The latest craze among governors in hard-right states has been to say, full of utterly wrong passionate intensity, that they won’t accept Syrian refugees within their borders. Meanwhile, we’re seeing what happens when another popular ultraconservative opt-out hobby—eroding women’s healthcare—comes to its obvious […]
Posted inGirls Only!
Want to Ruin Your Monday? Here’s Dayna Evans’ Expose of Sexism at Gawker
Gawker G is for galling. This week sucks, and it’s about to get suckier: Yesterday, Matter ran a lengthy piece by former Gawker.com staffer Dayna Evans, on Gawker’s “woman problem,” and right out of the gate, it’s bad. Behold, Gawker founder and CEO Nick Denton’s response to the New York Times‘ inquiry as to who’d […]
Posted inPolitics
Heroic Cat Cafe Employee Hollers About Yeast Infections, Drowns Out Anti-Choicers
Mary Numair God bless. I mean, the headline says it all, right? According to Slate, Purringtons Cat Lounge employee Mary Numair spotted anti-abortion protesters outside the Planned Parenthood health center on NE MLK Sunday, and improvised her own counter-protest with a supportive sign and chants about yeast infections. Numair explained to Slate that she wanted […]
Posted inCrafty
Grrrl in Motion: Alien She’s Riot Grrrl Capture
To begin Alien She properly, you have to go back to school. Specifically, the sparkling Arlene and Harold Schnitzer Center for Art and Design building’s 511 Gallery, part of the new PNCA campus. There you’ll find enough music, zines, and ephemera documenting the formative early ’90s era of the Riot Grrrl movement to immerse yourself […]