Feminism for Sale

The feminist movement has sold its activist soul to bodywash companies, maxi pad providers, pop stars and a host of other commodities hoping to cash in on its millennial appeal. In a live conversation, Cristen and Caroline talk to Bitch Media cofounder Andi Zeisler about marketplace feminism and her new book, "We Were Feminists Once."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Deep in the back of your mind. You've always had
the feeling that there's something strange about reality. There is
super anoid death, m nanopartic, mechanical messiahist, punch evolution. On
our award winning science podcast Stuff Abow Your Mind, we
examine neurological quandaries, cosmic mysteries, evolutionary marvels, and our trans
human future. New episodes come out Tuesdays and Thursdays on iTunes,

(00:20):
Google Play, Spotify, and anywhere you get your podcast. Welcome
to Stuff Mom Never Told You from how Stuff Works
dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Kristen
and I'm Caroline, and this is a special episode of

(00:43):
stuff Mom Never Told You because we get to talk
to the founder of a magazine and fabulous website that
we cite all of the time on Stuff Mom Never
Told You all the time, all the time, and that
is Andy Zeisler, who is the co founder of Bitch Media,
which is like an incredible media empire now started as

(01:03):
a zine in the nineties, as all great things do,
minus this podcast, which definitely did not start as a zne.
But maybe we should start a zne. Maybe we should.
We can do the reverse work our way back to
a zine. Yeah, we were thrilled to get to talk
to Zeisler live on stage at an event called Ladyfest

(01:23):
here in Atlanta, where Caroline and I reside um, and
we talked to Zeisler about her new book We were
Feminists once, from riot Girl to cover Girl, the buying
and selling of a political movement. Yeah, she was fabulous
to talk to. She is the most brilliant and yet
approachable awesome feminist I mean, aside from you, Kristen, Oh wow,

(01:46):
thank you. Yeah. But but we were so lucky to
get to sit on a stage with her and be
able to ask her all these questions. Kristin and I
had each just finished her book, and so what a
luxury and a privilege to finish a great book like
the one she's written and then sit down with the
author and ask her all sorts of questions. I mean,
the book centers on this idea of marketplace feminism and

(02:09):
how the feminist movement has changed and evolved over the decades,
and how we find ourselves now in this period where
people think that either putting on a T shirt that
says feminist a sort of the end all be all
that's you put on the T shirt this feminist and
you're done, you claim the label um or that uh,

(02:30):
choosing your choices is also the most important, rather than
for instance, fighting for paid family leave, fighting for equal pay,
things like that. Well, and she also focuses a lot
on how feminism has been commodified now and co opted
by a lot of companies which are realizing a what

(02:51):
a valuable demographic women are, but especially um, how much
feminist e taglines and messages reside with female consumer so um.
Famous examples of this type of empower tizing, as Zisor
calls it, would be Doves Real Bodies campaign. You also
have the always hashtag like a Girl campaign, which I

(03:16):
loved personally, I mean, like running like a girl. I
don't know what that has to do with maxi pads,
but it was like, that's great to see. You're right.
But what Zeisler does such a great job with is
digging through those viral moments to really, you know, kind
of question and explore and analyze, like what that really
means about modern feminism? Sure, and I mean speaking of

(03:39):
empower tizing, she goes deep on the issue of empowerment itself,
as well, and says that it's been drained of meaning
and really now in the modern sense that we throw
that word around in it tends to relate to personal branding.
It's becoming vague and a political rather than and you know,

(04:00):
empowering groups of people and all of us working together
and lifting as we climb. It's more about nowadays when
we say the word Kim Kardashian taking a naked selfie, yeah,
being used to justify whatever choices that you make, justify
them as necessarily feminist. UM. And the book itself is
also very accessible, regardless of how familiar you are or

(04:25):
aren't with feminist philosophy or UM texts, because Zeisler's bread
and butter is pop culture UM. She even the first
book that she wrote I was called Feminism and pop Culture,
And of course Bitch Magazine is all about analyzing pop
culture through a feminist lens. So the examples that she

(04:46):
uses UM are very familiar, but she weaves that into
a lot of research and a lot of UH books
and writing that Honestly, I now want to go through
and create a new reading list for myself to get
a better feminist education. Absolutely, and I feel the same
way and I guess I need to just quit my

(05:08):
job and go live in a cave so that I
can read all of the books. But well, can we
podcast in the cave? But yeah, I just can't do
anything else. Okay, So the cave will have Wifie and
a whole audio set up. Same you know, we'll bring
nol our producer. It's fine, Okay, So you'll be in
a sound studio in a cave. It just sounds really,
it sounds like I'm describing my apartment, Like my apartment

(05:31):
is very caveful. Like anyway, Well, let's talk a little
bit about Zeisler's background, because she goes into it a
little bit in our chat with her, but we want
to give you a few more details about her um
and how she came to co found Bitch. Yeah. One
thing that I loved finding out about her was how

(05:54):
clear she was kind of from the get go about
what she wanted to do. So she knew in high
school she wanted to work in magazines and even now.
In the interview, as you'll hear, she talks about how
she's still just adores print media and she loved the
fusion of politics and pop culture that she found in
so many of the magazines that she was consuming, and

(06:16):
she went after the very specific gig that she wanted,
and that was an internship when she was seventeen at
Sassy Magazine, the famed Sassy mag founded by Jane Pratt,
which um was really a foundational magazine. I feel like
for a lot of gen X women and millennial women

(06:37):
too who have gone back and now like ebayed um
and like read old issues online. Um. So she worked
there for a few months um when she was, like
I said, seventeen, and then she went to college and
graduated in from Colorado College and high tailed it to California. Yeah,

(07:00):
she's my mother friend Lisa. And it was this pair
of women who disgruntled by the political climate in the
wake of the Anita Hill Clarence Thomas debacle, the buyout
of Sassy magazine, so it was veering away from its
original voice and not to mention the fact that people
in pop culture who were speaking out about feminism were ignored.

(07:23):
Disgruntled by all this, these women co founded Bitch and
that was in n They wanted to reclaim the word
bitch because it's what women were being called to be
dismissed anyway, so we might as well reclaim it. Yeah,
I mean, and that's something that we talked about a
bit in our podcast from a while back on the

(07:45):
word bitch, if you want to go back and listen
to that after you listen to this. Um. So, in
two thousand one, the first issue of Bitch as a
full time organization was published, and because the Bay area
got really expensive of in the two thousands, in two
thousand seven, Bitch moved it's HQ to Portland's. So shout

(08:07):
out to our Portland listeners. I know you're out there,
and also Seattle. I count you both together, although I
know that you're different, um, but you are joined in
my mind. Um And in two thousand nine, Bitch became
the nonprofit Bitch Media, and I mean painting with a
large broad brush. That basically brings us up to now

(08:28):
when she's written this fabulous new book that we enjoyed
so much, and we definitely definitely encourage you to pick
it up, mainly so then we can all be in
a giant book club together and we can talk about it. Well,
let's go ahead and head on over to Lady Fest,
where we will warn you that the audio is that
of speaking live on a stage, so it doesn't sound

(08:52):
quite as crisp as it normally does when we're here
in our audio cave. Um, but definitely keep on listening
because Zeisler has many gems of wisdom to share. And
just a quick note before we deliver those gems of
wisdom from Andy's Eisler, we want to let you know

(09:12):
that towards the end of the episode, there are some
questions from the audience at the event. Those questions didn't
get picked up by the mike's unsurprisingly, and so you're
going to hear Kristen and me interjecting and basically summing
up what those questions for so that we can all
join in on the conversation. So with that, let's let

(09:34):
the chat role. Well, Andy, We're so excited to talk
to you tonight. I'm so excited to talk to you
and to you thanks for coming. Yeah, and thanks to
Lady Fest and Carris and everyone who helped put this
event together. Um, we have a lot to talk about,

(09:54):
but we are going to save room at the end
for questions. Um. So with that, shall we cook things off?
Let's do it. Let's do it? Okay, all right, Well,
since you are the co founder of Bitch magazine. We
must ask you about how that came to be and
also how I sort of the bridge between founding Bitch

(10:17):
and where pop culture was then and where it is
today in relation to feminism. Oh yeah, Um, well this
is our twentieth anniversary, and um, I have to say, Um,
I'm you know, certainly being asked to talk about that
a lot this year, and I feel like I need
a better line of response because usually when people ask me,

(10:37):
I'm like, well, I'm I'm actually pretty bummed that we're
still around. Um because when we started in uh, you know,
if you had told us how much things would sort
of backslide, you know politically, um, with respect to you know,
women's bottle, the autonomy and things like access to contraception,

(10:58):
just really basic human rights type of stuff, we would
have been like, no, we're we don't want to do
this project. It's too depressing already. Um. But you know,
but the flip side of that is, I think that
pop culture and media are places where that's where we
really have seen a lot of evolution, That's where we've

(11:18):
really seen a lot of positive stuff, and um, you know,
just to be able to to have been a part
of that, to have been a part of really locating
pop culture and media as a really fertile site of
feminist analysis and criticism and change. Um, it's really cool.

(11:39):
And uh, you know, as as far as you know
how we started and why we started, I mean, we
really just wanted to to take pop culture seriously, um
as a locust of activism and uh, and highlight and
and celebrate the spaces where where people were really bringing

(11:59):
feminist in contact with this kind of like mass media
culture that that we all consume. Well, so what was
the bridge from running Bitch to then writing this book,
Because you say in the introduction or towards the beginning
of the book that as you started writing it, all
of a sudden, feminism became cool. So what was that

(12:20):
bridge in between Bitch and writing the book and what
was going on as you were writing it? Yeah, So
it's interesting because I had started so the book Feminist,
the book Feminism and pop Culture that I wrote that
came out in two thousand and eight. Um, that was
very much kind of like a primer on the the
symbiotic relationship between feminism and pop culture that had been

(12:41):
going on since you know, the early part of the
twentieth century. Um. And because so much had happened with
respect to feminism and pop culture since two thousand eight. Um,
around two thousand and eleven, I started, you know, writing
a proposal for a book that sort of updated it. Um.
I speak a lot of colleges and you versities, and
so one of the things I hear a lot from

(13:02):
students is I really liked your book, but I feel
like so much has happened, or I feel like so
much has changed, or I feel like things have gotten better.
It's like, you're absolutely right, like this is a this
is this would be a really good sort of project
to to talk about how much has changed and in
many ways, how much has changed for the better. Um. Uh,
no one wanted that book. No one wanted to buy it.

(13:22):
The original publisher of feminism and pop culture did not
want that book. And UM, I mean, I feel like
this is kind of like maybe I shouldn't be telling
tales out of school. But I thought that was really
fascinating because what I really wanted to write was this
kind of celebration of how pop culture had had kind
of moved the needle on feminism and vice versa. How
these two, these two cultural forces were really influencing each

(13:45):
other to do more and too and to be better. Um.
But as it turns out, um, the publishing industry wants
you to say something kind of more controversial than things
have gotten better. Um. And And you know, when I
when I started thinking about it, you know, it did
occur to me that there was kind of a flip

(14:07):
side to feminism exerting more kind of pull in the
realm of popular culture and feminism. And that was, um,
that capitalism was also having a really profound effect on
how people understood feminism and the need for feminism, and
that in many ways, a lot of the concepts and

(14:29):
the activism that had been nurtured within exclusively feminist spaces
was suddenly being harnessed by capitalist forces to sell stuff
to people, primarily women. Um. And so you know, sort
of looking at how advertising was uh, kind of co

(14:49):
opting a lot of the feminist discourse that we had
begun seeing online and at a grassroots level that seemed
like a fertile topic and a and a way to
sort of ask like what happens? What happens when you
get what you want? You know what I mean, what
happens when popular culture becomes more feminist? What happens when uh,

(15:11):
you know, media representations of feminism become widespread and celebrities
start embracing it. And so for me that was kind
of the bridge and the question of, um, you know,
kind of social movement also be a trend and not
lose anything for that movement. Well, could you argue that
popular culture is becoming more feminist at this moment across

(15:33):
the board or is it just dressed like a feminist?
You know, I think it is. I think no, I
think it is becoming more feminist. I mean, certainly there
are ways in which it's it's just dressing like a feminist.
And I think we see that maybe most starkly in
the realm of um, you know, sort of bald naked capitalism,
like advertising. But if you look at, for instance, television, UM,

(15:56):
that's a medium that has become demonstrably more feminist in
the sense that it is grappling not just with surface
issues but with systemic institutional issues. Who is creating stuff,
who's writing stuff, who is having stuff funded? Uh? The
economics of television have changed profoundly in a way that

(16:19):
opens up a space for more feminist creation. You know,
we no longer just have major networks. We have streaming services, UM,
we have web series, We have ways in which UM
creations that are alternatives to the status quo are are
really making an impact. UM. So yeah, I definitely feel

(16:39):
like there are pockets where popular culture are becoming more
feminist and and that those are also um changing the
lens through which many of us view all of popular culture. UM.
You know, back in when we started Bitch, you really
couldn't find much in mainstream culture that grappled with feminism. Uh.

(17:02):
There was stuff in academia, you know, you had like
Bell Hooks UM and Angela McRobbie and Dave Hickey talking
about uh issues with with feminist politics and representation. And
on the other end, you maybe had the occasional mention
of feminism, usually negatively in a place like Rolling Stone.
But there wasn't there was a vast space in the

(17:25):
middle that was neither looking nor caring to look at
culture through a feminist lens. And now you have you know,
Entertainment Weekly talking about the Bechdel Test. You have the
New York Times, you know, having two of its columnists
debate you know, women's roles in upcoming summer movies or
talking about the economics of um directing in Hollywood. So

(17:49):
it really is a place where as a lens as
a critical way to talk about what is and is
not existing in media and pop culture. Um, it's a
it's a it's a changed world. Well, and one thing
that you talk about in the book that has also
changed is our popular language of how we talk about feminism,

(18:11):
or at least what uh corporate entities would have us
think feminism is, specifically when it comes to something you
term empower tizing the whole thing of like buying the
thing that will make you feel better about yourself because
you're a strong woman. So, uh, we wanted you to
read a passage from the chapter in the book about

(18:33):
empowerment because I feel like, as someone who spends like
far too much time on the internet, Uh, empowerment is
a buzzword to the point that it's really meaningless in
a lot of ways. Um, so could you read to
us from that? Sure? Um? Yeah, So this is chapter seven.
It's called empowering Down. I have a bad case of

(18:56):
empowerment fatigue. The causes are legion pr e males that
begin with the phrase, I represent a brand whose sole
purpose is to empower women, Particularly around that time of
the month, women's magazine articles that promise empowering beauty tips,
followed by celebrity interviews in which Jennifer Aniston exclaims that
not wearing makeup for a role was so empowering. As

(19:19):
a catch all phrase that can be understood to mean
anything from self esteem building to sexy and feminine too awesome,
empowerment has become a way to signify a particularly female
way of being. It's both gender essentialist, because when was
the last time you heard a strip aerobics class for
men described as empowering and commercially motivated over the past

(19:41):
two decades. A partial list of everything that has been
deemed empowering by advertising campaigns, pop culture products, and feminist
rhetoric includes the following high heels, flats, cosmetic surgery, embracing
your wrinkles, having children, not having children, natural childbirth, how
being an epidural, embracing fat positivity, embracing anorexia, housework, living

(20:06):
like a slab, learning self defense, buying a gun, being butch,
being fem driving a truck, riding a motorcycle, riding a bike, walking, running, yoga,
pole dancing classes, growing your own food, butchering your own meat,
doing drugs, getting sober, having casual sex, embracing celibacy, being

(20:28):
a good friend, being a pole. By the time satirical
newspaper The Onion announced women now empowered by Everything a
woman does in a two thousand three article, it really
did seem that today's woman lives in a near constant
state of empowerment. More than ten years after that article,
empowerments association with women, power, activism, and success seems to

(20:52):
be its most robust legacy, and in media and popular
culture it's still very much in earnest and unquestioning use
by younger generation who have never known the term is
anything other than a way to say, this is a
thing that I, as a woman like to do. Empowerment
is both a facet of choice feminism. Anything can be
a feminist choice if a feminist makes that choice, and

(21:13):
a way to circumvent the use of the word feminist itself.
But what is empowerment and who does it benefit? In
most cases the answers are, respectively, whatever I decided it
is and pretty much just me. Yeah, And that's that's
a theme that comes up. Uh. That's a theme that
comes up again and again, the idea of pulling yourself

(21:37):
up by your bootstraps, empowering yourself. You're a feminist, so
you're good. So that's so, that's good, and that's the
end of the story. But so so where did we
get lost? I guess where where did we take a
wrong turn? From from having empowerment actually me and lifting
as we climb and caring about the community and helping
truly empower others to to to participate in this movement

(22:00):
and where it is now where if I wear high
heels or flats, I am somehow empowered? Yeah? I mean
it it really and I mean I talked about this
in the book how Empowerment you know, originally started as
this term that was about you know, lifting as you
climb and specifically about you know, sort of marginalized communities

(22:22):
and communities UM that no longer wanted to be you know,
endowed by top down you know, sort of charity focused organizations. UM.
And it really was about a sort of ongoing ethic
and a system UM. And it has become more of
a kind of static finite concept where like you buy something,

(22:45):
you buy something or you're empowered. You make a decision
and you're empowered. UM. You choose to be empowered, and
that is itself in it is in itself empowering. So
I mean, I think the short answer, um is capitalism,
and sadly that's the short answer for a lot of problems. UM.
But yeah, it really does come down to this idea

(23:08):
of UM, you know, the threat of what happens when
women interface with structural power UM and sort of softening
it into this idea of individuals rather than systems. So
when we talk about empowerment, we're talking about individuals. We're

(23:28):
not talking about UM foundational transformational change that helps everybody UM.
And a lot of that is because of this concept
of choice as the coin of the realm in feminism,
and that's always been aspect that's always been an aspect
of feminist movements. I mean it really, you know, it's

(23:48):
not as though feminism was once this you know, utterly
pure um, you know, completely other focused movement. There's always
been elements of you know, certainly uh, personal advancement and
compromise that leaves you know, whole swaps of people out. So,
you know, I think the shift toward empowerment as the

(24:11):
overarching structure was somewhat organic. Um, because feminism or feminisms
more accurately, huge, huge movements that you know, have always
grappled with how best to address structural issues, how best
to allocate power? Um? You know, which issues are uh

(24:34):
going to be outwardly focused and most appealing to people
who need to get on board for it to succeed.
So I mean, in a lot of ways, um, you know,
feminism has always been very right for kind of capitalist
co optation. And as we have become a much more
marketplace society, as we have been encouraged to see consumer

(24:57):
choice as sort of a stand in for structural change, Um,
it makes a lot of sense that the empowerment framework
would sort of replace the liberation for everyone framework. Well,
and you you say that, uh, feminism was ripe for
this kind of co optation. So I was wondering, compared
to other kinds of social justice movements, like why feminism

(25:22):
in particular being so vulnerable to this kind of uh effect. Yeah,
I mean that's such a good question, And you know
it's I think that most social movements have seen some
degree of co optation, but I think feminism, um, because
it has always, um, it has always addressed and sort

(25:46):
of worked on women's innate need to appease other people
and to present kind of a a good, happy, um,
not angry face to the world. I mean, I think
it's feminism has been very prone to internalizing, uh, the

(26:08):
issues that all social movements face about you know, what
it means to to ask for stuff, what it means
to be unapologetic, what it means to really stand for something, um,
and and make people profoundly unhappy by just doing that. UM.
So yeah, I think that there has always been this

(26:32):
this thread of like, well, if we can just make
feminism attractive to more people, uh, then we'll really get
what we want. And you know, we've seen this track.
We've seen this fail over and over again, because that's
not how social movements work. They don't work by appeasing
other people. Um. But for some reason, there's been a

(26:54):
very strong thread uh, both within the movement and from
outside of real internalizing the criticism of you know, if
you just ask for this more nicely, maybe we'll give
it to you. Uh. If you just look a little prettier,
just like shave a little makeup, you know, like maybe

(27:14):
we'll consider getting on board with you. Um, And that's
a dynamic that that sadly is still very much in play.
So speaking about getting on board with you, I did
underline where you referenced alan Alda in the seventies, like
getting on board with our bodies, ourselves and getting on
board with second way feminism. And so that made me, I,

(27:38):
you know, I'm like circling Alan Alda because I'm like, hey,
I love Alan Alda and I had no idea that
I loved him even more now, um, And then I,
you know, I do an Errand I was like, but
Matt mcgory, because Matt mcgory, like, good for him. He,
you know, for anybody who doesn't know he's one of
the guards on, aren't just a new black. He's like
a very outspoken U maile fminist He you know, calls

(28:01):
himself an ally And on the one hand, that's great,
but a lot of people are shouting him down, saying
that he's like taking over the conversation and that he
needs to have a seat and all of this stuff.
So that's sort of the double the double conundrum of like, Okay,
you've got celebrity feminism because in this marketplace, feminism. It's
it's so cool to call yourself that, whether or not

(28:22):
you actually do anything with it. But then you've got
the issue of of men claiming feminism too, and Matt mcgory.
So I'm just I don't know what my question is
other than like you just want to bash Matt mcgide,
I kind of do. I'm he seems really he seems
very sincere. But at the same time, like, you know, okay,

(28:45):
so let's say we had Instagram in the seventies and
let's say Alan Alda took a shirtless selfie. You know,
the prominent feminist text of the time, I mean not
a It is really around optics and this idea of like, um,

(29:06):
what is the what is the reason? What is this
person standing to gain? And I think, you know, again,
we're such we're a much more mediated culture than we
were even twenty years ago, much less in the nineteen seventies,
and so there is this sense of like celebrities, it's
it's it can be a lot easier to distrust them

(29:26):
because we know that they're competing for airtime. We know
that they are, you know, one of of millions of
possible photo ops um, and we know that they do
tend to sort of latch onto the zeitgeist um and
use that for whatever they need to use it for.
I mean, that's that's what they do. Um. You know,

(29:47):
Alan Aldo was part of a a targeted campaign by
Miss Magazine in the nineteen seventies to really raise awareness
on behalf of the Equal Rights Amendment being ratified. So
there was a very tan doble static goal there and
um and and Miss Magazine did this whole campaign where
they went out of you know, after tons of people, um,

(30:09):
you know, some of whom were really uh you know,
sort of attractive and young, and some of whom were
more like old guard to sort of get to sort
of cover their bases in terms of who they wanted
to um, really be mouthpieces for the e r A.
I think now it's a little bit more diffuse because
there isn't just one issue. There isn't just one campaign

(30:30):
that we're working towards, and there isn't just one entity
that's really trying to sort of rally the troops. UM.
But yeah, I mean I think there's a valid, uh,
there's a valid point to be made that we often
reward um, the people for speaking up who are least challenging.

(30:51):
And you know, that could be a young white starlet
like Emma Watson Um who says things that feminist device
of all kinds have been saying for decades. But when
she says that, everyone's like, WHOA, I get it now
it's coming out of this face and she's her maiyanee

(31:11):
and all of a sudden she's seen like I'm getting it.
And I think there's this idea too of like, uh,
celebrities don't have to be feminists, they don't have to
get on board. They have everything, So maybe if someone
like Matt mcgorri Emma Watson is speaking up, that must
mean it's valid. Um. There's a very weird way that

(31:33):
we distrust people who we see having too much skin
in the game, you know what I mean. Like people
don't want to hear a rape victim talking about why
rape is bad. They're like, whoa, she's too close to it,
you know what I mean. It's almost like if we
had if we were like sending an astronaut to space,
and we were like, we can't send that guy. He's
got too much of a physics background, Like we're gonna

(31:56):
send this dude who read a book. Um, So there's
this there's this weird distrust of like people with experiential
knowledge and people who seem to care too much. And
so when you have someone like Matt mcgoory, who's like
this hunky actor on a hit TV show talking about
the importance of feminism and like being all woke and stuff, um,

(32:21):
you know, people are like, well, he doesn't have to
do this, it must be legit um. And yeah, there's
there's certainly a way where that can get wearisome, especially
when again, feminist activists of all stripes have been saying
the same stuff for years and not getting even a
fraction of the of the props for it. So I

(32:43):
gotta ask you about Beyonce then, because it to that. Um,
because one one, uh moment that you say early in
the book is Beyonce at the v M A standing
in front of the massive like feminist uh you know,
back lit thing. And in a lot of ways it

(33:04):
seems like she was kind of the one who opened
up the floodgates of the popularity that we see the
guysis of feminism. So I'm curious to know your thoughts
on on Bay. Yeah, I mean that was a huge moment,
and for someone like me who grew up in the
nineteen eighties wondering why someone like Madonna would not align

(33:26):
herself explicitly with feminism, that was a huge moment um
because again, so much of how a lot of my
generation came to feminism was almost in spite of its
terrible optics and it's terrible pr It was like, well, okay,
everyone's expecting me to just be this you know, gross

(33:48):
person in an acid wash vest um talking about how
much she hates men, and you know that's really not
what it's about. But with Beyonce, that the concept of
you know, eight billion people, many of them young people,
um coming to feminism for the very first time seeing
it attached to the optics of Beyonce. You know, this beautiful, successful,

(34:12):
biggest pop star in the world that's incredibly powerful. And
you saw in the days afterwards that like just the
Google searches for feminists just shot up, and it was like,
that's that's something. You know, if people if people's first
first association with feminism is Beyonce, um, I'm not going
to argue with that. At the same time, that moment

(34:36):
did not happen in a vacuum. You know, it happened
in many ways because of a you know, decades long
ground swell of more grassroots feminist work and stuff that
was really percolating on the Internet and on social media
and on college campuses and in in uh, you know,
community organizing. So having Beyonce kind of put her flag

(34:59):
in the ground for feminism also, you know, was was
fairly interpreted as a way to sort of capitalize that
and make that part of the Beyonce brand, which already
incorporated a lot of stuff. Um. So yeah, certainly, I
think there's there's a few ways to look at it. Um.

(35:20):
But I also think that Beyonce, for some reason has
been a really weird flash point for a lot of
people who are otherwise um, very gung ho about celebrity feminism.
And we certainly saw this leading up to that VM
a moment where um, you know, Beyonce's feminism had been
debated in public forums for years leading up to that,

(35:43):
and I was like, oh, well, Beyonce is a feminist.
Of course, she's a feminist, listen to Destiny's Child. But
then like, oh, Beyonce is not a feminist. She's not
wearing any pants. Um, so there were these very specific ways,
many of them rooted in, uh, you know, racism, that
people didn't want not want to allow Beyonce that feminist
identification in the same way they sort of took it

(36:04):
at face value from a lot of other female celebrities. Right, yeah,
we we definitely we did a Beyonce episode and we
definitely got the exact same responses of like, she doesn't
wear pants and I didn't realize I did wear pants
to be a feminist guy. Good job everybody, all right,

(36:25):
But I mean that moment, it was It was a
total like launch of a thousand think pieces moment. And
the Internet sometimes I sound like such an old The Internet, uh,
can can feel sometimes like it's collapsing in on itself,
especially when it comes to the feminist think piece Capital
Left Capital Team. And so I'm I'm wondering about your

(36:49):
take on that space on the Internet, and where's the
line between helpful analysis and and pausitive of reporting on issues,
and like you guys are just dog biling each other
about who's a better or worse feminist? Like where spelt line?
And quickly before you answered that question, the that in

(37:10):
the background of um something you wrote about in Bitch
and uh an editor's letter not long ago about how
feminist media has also been co opted in a way
of like, you have venture capital flowing into like women's
sights to churn out these kinds of click baby pieces. Yeah,
I mean that's a who that's a huge subject um

(37:33):
and that I feel like it's been coming up a
lot lately because we do have this kind of the Internet,
especially with respect to women's subjects, feminist subjects, has become
this real clickbait economy where it often isn't about analysis,
it's about pitting two viewpoints against each other because these

(37:53):
outlets know that it's going to generate, you know, a
rash of hate reading and commenting and sharing that's going
to translate into advertising dollars. It's not about furthering a conversation.
It's about making money for you know, organizations that in
ten years will probably have a completely different focus that's
making an equal amount of money. Um So yeah, but uh,

(38:17):
in terms of yeah, it's it is And again this
is not unique to this moment in feminism. There has
always been a way in which it's much easier, uh,
to sort of have um, feminist viewpoints sort of sniping
at one another and uh and backbiting, because it it

(38:43):
saves us from having to tackle the really difficult, challenging,
uh insurmountable questions that have to do with things like
capitalism and institutionalized sexism. Um. So yeah, I mean it's again,
it's it's natural, and it's probably inevitable in many ways,

(39:04):
but I do think we have to talk about the
the uh, the way that it is becoming com modified
to a vastly unhelpful degree. Um, you know, and as
a as a feminist media creator, I feel like it's
hard for me to talk about this stuff without being
accused of sort of sour graping or being jealous, because yeah,

(39:25):
I'm hella jealous that like Bustle got I forget how
much a lot, like six point five million in venture
capital um because the you know, the person who the
venture capital capitalists who found it was like, yeah, I
don't know, I just I just don't see a lot
of feminist meeting media out there for women and like
wherever they're going, Like us, you could give that money

(39:48):
to like do you know what we could do with
like five hundred thousand dollars much less six point five million. Uh,
but but yeah, it's sort of not about that. It's
sort of about the idea that you're gonna you know,
you have your own thing that you own, and that
ends up churning out you know, sort of listicals like
the five times that Taylor Swift's cat was the most

(40:12):
feminist cat ever. Um, because again, like that's that's easy
that for that does not ask people to confront industries.
It doesn't ask people to confront really entrenched systems. Um.
It's fun and it you know, makes us feel good
about what we're consuming. It makes us feel like, okay,

(40:35):
so this is feminist. That means it's okay for me
to consume it, and I don't have to think too
hard about you know, the sort of larger scope of
of what's happening here. I don't know if I answered
your guy went off on that. I don't know if
I answered that. I lot of feelings about this well,
and that brings up, um, a lot of this choice

(40:55):
feminism that has written about. You know, a lot of
those listicals are kind of based around the whole like
I choose my choice, you know, sort of ethos and
I'm wondering what the relationship is between choice feminism and
what you term marketplace feminism, because it seems like they
are like dependent on one another, and did one like

(41:16):
which came first? Kind of like, how do we untangle
the two and get back to you know, starting point? Yeah,
I mean, I think in a lot of ways, choice
feminism has has always existed on some level as as
part of UH feminist movements and as part of the
sort of discourse around what it means to be feminist. Um.

(41:36):
And at the same time, marketplace feminism has always existed
on some level in the sense that as long as
there have been feminist movements, there have been industries uh
and entities looking to cash in on them. Um. You know.
So for instance, when you know, in the in the
early nineteen twenties, when it became okay for women to

(41:56):
smoke cigarettes in public, you know, you had the too
big tobacco companies basically saying, well, we can cash in
on this because this is a huge new demographic for us.
How are we going to do that. We're gonna do
it by equating the freedom to smoke with the freedom
to you know, be a citizen of the world and
to exist in public. Um. And that was you know,

(42:19):
that was a very canny move, like advertisers are not
done at all, um. And as time has gone on,
I definitely think that choice feminism has paralleled the development
of an ever more consumerist, ever more individualist society. And
the reason why I coined the term marketplace feminism and

(42:41):
didn't just build on, you know, other pre existing terms
like commodity feminism or corporate feminism is because the idea
of choice is so paramount, the idea that you can
sort of go through life with this kind of buffet
mentality like, oh, I'm choosing this, this looks good that no, Um,

(43:02):
that you can just kind of embrace or discard things
that will uh and and sort of cobble together a
feminist outlook or a feminist image or a feminist identity
from them seems really important because again, it allows people
to engage um with the most attractive or easiest aspect

(43:23):
of feminism as a social movement and as a lens
and as a politic and really refused to engage with
the ways in which it is structural, it is entrenched, um.
And it is not a rewarding kind of fight, you
know what I mean. It's it's like a it's a battle.
So so, feminism obviously has been co opted in many

(43:46):
ways by capitalism. Um, but it's also more popular than
ever before, as you've talked about, so is it? Is
it a bad thing? Like all of the corporate interests aside?
What do we do with this popularity of feminism because
it seems I mean, it seems like horrible to say, like, well,
I wish you weren't so popular, but okay, yeah, I

(44:10):
mean feminism like feminism. It's not like an indie band
that you're like, oh god, I was really into it
and I'm not popular right now. They saw were the
original feminism, and I think, you know, and often when
I talk about this stuff, that's the response I get.
I mean, most of that is from people who don't
care about feminism and are not interested anyway, and they're
basically just trolls like, oh, she's isn't like feminism anymore popular? Um,

(44:33):
But that's not really it. I mean, I I think
the most and this is again this has always been true.
I think the most important part of sort of harnessing
feminism's moment um for a lasting impact and a more
than surface level effect is really critical thinking, um and
and thinking about like, well, you know, what is the

(44:55):
difference between a corporation using feminist lang which but not
changing any of its business practices. Say, what's the difference
between that and between you know, small independent companies, say,
you know, coming up with inventions that that truly are
toward a more equal world, or marketing concepts that that

(45:18):
really do try to take the shame out of I
don't know, like menstrual products or condoms or something like that.
I think there's a difference. And we live in a
society and a consumer cultural culture that often tries to
flatten those differences and convince us that one product is
the same as the other, or one parent company is
the same as the other. And I think it's really
up to us, as consumers and as people who are

(45:39):
constantly marketed to UM, to really put the onus on
ourselves to decide which is which and to really use
as much of our critical thinking faculties as we can
to UM to think about you know, are we what
are we doing? Is it in the service of equality,
Is it in the service of UM really making the
world and equitable place for everyone, or is it just

(46:02):
in the service of doing the work of multinational corporations
for them. Yeah, I mean you speak extensively about Dove,
for instance, in the book with their you know, a
decade plus of campaigns and how those have evolved all
around you know, real bodies, etcetera, etcetera, and body positivity
and things like that. So I mean, is it is

(46:25):
it better could you argue to support a company like
Dove that's like using their evil powers for slight reasons
or Yeah, I mean that's that's a good question because
and and again, this is a place where we're sort
of like, um, we often feel very powerless against capitalism,
and it's it's it's very natural to be like, well,

(46:47):
I'm going to be advertised to anyway, um, which is
the least bad way to sort of negotiate my role
as a consumer within that. Um. And and Dove is
a Dove is a really interesting example because when that
campaign for real beauty started, it was really promising. You know,
they had they had scholars, they had global studies. Um.

(47:12):
The early ads really were um jarring in a very beautiful,
impactful way that they were using bodies and people and
faces um that we never associate with beauty. But as
time went on and it became more you know, widespread,
and it got more notice, it started becoming more and

(47:34):
more homogenized, to the point where now it's sort of
like this kind of very empty platitudes, um that pay
lip service to the idea of difference but don't represent
it in any meaningful way. Um. And so you know,
I think that's important. And then all the while, of
course they're peddling you know, skin lightning cream to women

(47:55):
across South Asia, um or you know, making act body
spray or whatever. You know, that's I mean that you know,
Dove's parent company is the same parent company as as
as body Spray as fair and Lovely lightning creams, so
that matters. Um. So it's sort of like, well, is
it better to support Dove than to support I don't

(48:17):
know who else makes this stuff. I'm just trying to
think of another soap company, Like I don't know Jennifer,
she knows so much about fee. So yeah, but I
think we're in a but we're in a good place
now because it's sort of like, well, we we could
support Dove and we could buy into the line that like,

(48:38):
well they really want us to be more confident, um.
But also maybe my under arms aren't white enough, and
it just so happens that they created this deodorant to
make my under arms look better. Um So we could
yeah right, we're all waiting for it. Um So we
could support that. But we could also go on Etsy,

(48:59):
you know, a corporation that actively recruits, you know, female
developers and supports female creators and artisans, and we could
buy some soap that's made by a person who is
not going to turn around and use those profits for
their parent company to promote racism in South Asia. It's
like we have more choices than we did even a

(49:21):
decade ago. Um. So, I think a lot of the
time it really is again a matter of thinking about,
you know, where your dollars are going to make a difference,
because we'll always be consumers, will always be encouraged to consume,
will always be tempted to consume. It can be really fun. Um.
But I think the best tools that we have at

(49:42):
our disposal now are are really are our critical thinking
faculties and our ability to research. Um. What it means
for a company like Dove to be uh kind of
co opting the language of a feminism. Caroline trips to

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the homepage and type in stuff at stamps dot com
enter stuff. So now comes the Q and a portion

(50:49):
of our Lady Fest event with Andy Zeisler. And like
we said at the top of the podcast, the audio
was a little sketchy when the audience members were speaking,
and so we're gonna paraphrase. And the first audience member
who stood up and asked a question wanted to further
the conversation that we had sort of touched on during

(51:11):
the interview about Beyonce. Right, Beyonce is such a lightning
rod in the in the conversation around modern feminism, and
with the release of her album Lemonade and her videos
for Lemonade, UM, we saw Bell Hooks come out and
write an essay basically Bell Hooks was not down with

(51:33):
Beyonce's Lemonade. And so this audience member, who feels really
invested in both Beyonce and bell Hooks as feminists, described
how she felt like this was evidence of a larger
schism in modern feminism, perhaps a generation gap. And so
here's Andy addressing that audience member's question. Yeah, I mean

(51:54):
that's it is. That's that's I've had those same reactions
to reading bell Boks on Beyonce, and especially because you know,
Bell Hooks was the one who wrote a book called
Feminism Is for Everybody, you know, and she's been such
a um someone who has done so much incredible foundational

(52:15):
work in locating um, you know, critical feminist and race
theory within pop culture. So it is, it's very it's
very hard to read stuff like that. It feels like
you know, your your mom's are fighting, or your two
favorite ants or fighting, and just like stop, um, you know,
but I also think it can be worthwhile to have

(52:37):
conversations about, you know, the limits of this kind of
discourse and the limits of UM sort of trying to
define what is a pure feminism. And I think, you know,
this provides an opportunity to say, maybe there's no such thing.
You know, maybe we're all working in these very circum

(53:00):
subscribed systems UM where obviously our experiences and our priorities
are going to affect how we um, how generously we
sort of understand one another's UM goals, and there may
be places where we're not always going to agree. And

(53:20):
I think that's certainly been a long time fracture within
feminist movements, this idea that there has to be a
unified front UM. And I you know, I feel like
most of the young activists I've come into contact with
over the past two decades have been have really opened
my eyes in terms of saying, like, it can't it's

(53:40):
not going to just be one movement, because if it is,
it's going to be the same as it ever was,
and the concerns of the loudest, the richest, the widest,
the most privileged are always going to rise to the top. UM.
So maybe we need to let go of the idea
that it needs to be a united front. So that's
me trying to be optimistic about that. I'm obviously Yeah.

(54:06):
So the second question was coming from a young woman
in the audience who wanted to know whether there were
any alternative paths toward gender equality that Zeisler could suggest.
She asked, do you have any insight on models to
dismantle structures? Because she said, I feel like a lot
of responses to feminism today or tear it down, build

(54:29):
a new thing, which is the philosophy I subscribe to,
but not everyone has the luxury of fighting the system
every day. Well, and that's similar to I'm going to
piggyback on that question because I was wondering how you
do take this and the idea of feminism being something
that you do, not just a label that you wear

(54:50):
because it's really cool. Um, if you are someone who
feels powerless to create that kind of systemic change, or
maybe you're just exhausted because you have like two jobs
and a kid, whatever it might be, you know what
I mean, Like in the same kind of way of like,
what are the accessible ways that we can do the

(55:11):
work of feminism. Yeah, and again, I think this is
one of those places where we are in a very
very lucky and and fruitful time to be having these conversations. Um.
You know, I think even in the past, like even
when I was in college in the nineteen nineties, there
was a sense of like, if you weren't going to
go whole hog, if you weren't going to go all

(55:32):
in and devote your life to being an activist, what
was the point because you wouldn't conceivably be able to
do much. Um, So there was this sense of like, well,
I don't you know, I don't have the bandwidth to
to march all the time. I'm not a rabble rouser
I you know. You know, people felt like what can

(55:54):
I do given the type of person I am, with
the constraints I have in my life, with the needs
I have of to you know, go to school or
have you know, have a job, or support my family.
And I think now we're in a time where there
are so many more avenues that we actually see working
as modes of activism and modes of change. Um. You know,

(56:16):
a lot of people get down on things like social
media and Twitter or you know, say, you know, call
its activism or hashtag activism or something. But in fact,
social media has opened up so much more space for
activism among people who probably would not have identified as activists, um,

(56:37):
who for reasons of their families, or their religion or
their jobs, would not be able to be an activist
in the classic mold. But with the you know, with
the time they have, with the tools they have, are
able to be part of really huge, um transformational campaigns
and discourses around feminism and activism. Um you know. Likewise, eyes,

(57:00):
I think we see more people understanding that it activism
isn't necessarily it doesn't necessarily have to be a career.
It doesn't necessarily have to be something that you do
seven And if you don't do seven, that doesn't mean
you're a failure as an activist or shouldn't be doing
it or are a dilatant um. So yeah, I mean,

(57:20):
I think there are a lot of really concrete ways
that we see people making change simply by speaking up,
being part of a community, being part of a project, um,
you know, devoting a finite set of hours and resources
to to working on the issues that they care about.
And I think too, we see a way in which Um,

(57:44):
the kind of uh pluralism of activism, the the way
that you don't have to be one kind of feminist
or one kind of anti racist. Um, we see ways
in which that actually makes a different. It's like, maybe
it's good to be less of a generalist and more
of a specialist in terms of activism. So yeah, I

(58:05):
mean I think I think we're in for people who
care about issues, who have specific issues that they want
to work on. Um. I think at this point there's
kind of no excuse for for not at least like
getting your foot in there and and and starting to
do it. So our third question came from an audience
member who wanted to know not only whether we thought

(58:31):
that the feminist movement happening right now would maintain its momentum,
but also whether it would help to propel real change.
I think it already is. I mean if we just
look at like language and awareness around gender, for instance,
which in a lot of ways was fostered through social

(58:55):
media and through the Internet, I mean, I feel like
that's something huge that's broken through. Yeah, I mean I
think just the the the breaking out of language that
is often um, sort of caseted in these movements. Having
ways to sort of disseminate that out into the world

(59:16):
I think is really powerful. I mean, I you know,
I use the example of like the Stubenville rape case
in Ohio or the Bill Cosby case, where you know,
we saw language that had previously been kind of confined
to feminist activist spaces coming in contact with mainstream media,
and maybe they shrugged at it at first, maybe they

(59:37):
were like a victim blaming what's that? But you know,
the more you repeat something and the more it becomes
accessible and legible, um, the more it becomes just part
of a sort of quotitian ambient feminism. And I think
that's what's happening, you know. I mean we all understand
now that you know, domestic violence is not something that's

(59:57):
okay and you shouldn't be able to like beat your
wife get away with it. In the nineteen sixties, that
was a new concept. So yeah, I mean things I've
had lasting effects, um, and I absolutely think they will
going forward as well. And it maybe like a one
step forward, two steps back, or two steps forward, one
step back situation, but it's going to happen. So as
a follow up to the previous question, another person raised

(01:00:19):
their hand to ask whether social media and so called
seal activism as it's often derisively referred to, can also
make an impact and change the world offline. So some
of you might remember, like it was several years ago
when the Susan G. Coleman Foundation, the breast cancer charity,

(01:00:43):
decided that they were no longer going to fund mammograms
for low income women at plant Parenthood because plant parenthood
also does abortions. Um. And they really thought they were
going to get away with that. Uh. They did not
count on the power of social media and the power
of a kind of rapid response to really destabilize this

(01:01:07):
idea that you know, Um, they didn't have to be
transparent as a charity organization. Um. And a lot of
that was focused on It wasn't just focused on abortion.
It was focused on this very intersectional idea of sure,
abortion is accessible if you're already in a particularly privileged place. Um,

(01:01:28):
but mammograms uh, and you know, the ability to access
contraception and all these things are also part of reproductive
rights and reproductive justice. And I think again, this is
one of those things that the enormity of it, the
response and the fact that planned parenthood was able to
you know, raise more in donations than they would have

(01:01:49):
stood to lose from the defunding. I think that really
made an impact on people understanding that it's not you know,
it's not just about UH abortions, it's not just about access.
It's about really holding institutions and the people who run
them accountable for the things that they want to take

(01:02:10):
away from people. UM. And so I always, you know,
I always think of that when I think about, you know,
social media and its ability to really make change, UM,
because I do think the more we talk about UH
issues around you know, you know, better feminist adjacent or
civil rights adjacent adjacent, the more social media is able

(01:02:32):
to um kind of really break them down and point
out the ways in which they are UH, in which
they overlap with a lot of other issues, and the
ways in which they aren't black and white and they
aren't cut and dry, they have all these other elements. UM.
And so yeah, I mean, I again, like this might

(01:02:52):
just be me being optimistic, but I have a lot
of faith in UH in social media to kind of
make very big, monumental conversations very accessible and very legible
to people who might even be coming to them for
the very first time. Yeah, I mean, I think that's
something that we've seen to running the spinty social media.

(01:03:13):
It's beautiful to watch people, whether it's around issues of
sexuality or gender, race, ethnicity, you know, socio economics be
able to form these communities and find each other and
talk and and and create movements. But I am curious
about is there sort of like an in group fallacy

(01:03:34):
going on? Almost because at the same time that we're
seeing all of these beautiful movements and people coalescing online
and in real life, we're also seeing reproductive rights tipped away.
We're seeing trans rights and LGBT rights tipped away with
things like the North Carolina bathroom bill. So like, how
are those two things, these two things are coexisting. Yeah,

(01:03:56):
I mean, and that's definitely a good point. I think. Um,
I see these things kind of happening in part because
there is such a groundswell of movement that people are panicking.
We are as a society extremely prone to doing this
kind of zero something where we assume that any gains

(01:04:18):
for one group mean a loss for the other group.
And so I mean, I think so much of the
panic and the fear um around things like trans rights
and uh, women's reproductive autonomy are in part or result
of the gains that have happened and the fact that

(01:04:38):
we do see much more more of a signal boost
for these things. Um. Yeah, this question came to us
from basically the leader of Atlanta's Lady Fest, Chelsea, and
she she brought up some really good points. She said,
you know, there are a lot of women's centric events
that happen like lady Fest. They're all women, they celebrate women.

(01:05:03):
But she was saying that she felt really torn because
here she is spending a lot of time and money
helping Ladyfest happen and helping it blossom and featuring women,
and that yes, it is important to have these spaces.
But the thing is if women are celebrated just once
a month, but the rest of the year, she says,
it's still dude Fest every day. How do we tackle this?

(01:05:26):
How do we bring more women into the everyday discussion.
That's such a good question. I mean, that's such a
I mean, it's it's kind of evergreen. I mean I
remember in the late nine um going to Lili Fair
and really sort of grappling with the idea of like,
what does it mean that this festival is now letting
all these other like total sausage party and music festivals

(01:05:49):
essentially off the hook for having any female participation. Um
And and you know, what does it mean too that
it's kind of been essentializing the idea of what kind
of music women make, um, and what kind of art
they make and what kind of art is appealing to
other women. UM. So I think that's it's it's such
a good question. It's such a complicated question, and frankly,

(01:06:12):
I'm not really sure how to answer it, um, you know,
except to say that I think it's possible to sort
of simultaneously do this work of saying, you know, it's
important to to celebrate um, you know, women, people who
identify as women, the work they do, them, the importance

(01:06:33):
of of having that space for them, and also really
talk about what it what it means to sort of
segment out and does that go against a sort of
larger project of of really building equity for everyone in
these spaces. Well, that's all the time that we have

(01:06:55):
for questions. Although can I ask one final quick questions?
You're things I'm like a high note. Um And since
don't let it be about Hillary Clinton, please, It's like
really waiting for that. No. I wanted to know since
pop culture is your jam, I wanted. I was wondering

(01:07:17):
if you have any pop culture shoutouts, like what what
are your favorite things happening right now that you love?
Oh my god, this is this question where like I
need to prepare a list because like everything flies out
of my head. It's like going to the grocery store
without a list, just like walking out with every day. Um.
I know there's there's so much that I've loved in
the past year, and I will say that it's mostly

(01:07:41):
TV related because, um, I work a ton and I
have a child, so I rarely leave my house to
be entertained. Uh So, like a ton of Netflix stuff
like Master of None I just loved. I'm so excited
for it. I would watch like seven seasons like right
in a row. Um. And I know people are sort

(01:08:01):
of mixed on Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, but I sort of
love it. I just think it's so um it's just
so fast paced, and it's so kind of rapid fire referential,
and I think it really rewards people who are kind
of like me, pop culture obsessives. Um, I am I've
been obsessed with Game of Thrones since the start, and

(01:08:24):
I feel like that obsession is really starting to pay
off this season. And I'm not like finally broken away
from the books. Yeah, like no, I'm not gonna like
spoil anything, but it's getting real. It's good. Um yeah,
and uh and you know it's funny because this is
not always like a feminist thing, but as a magazine

(01:08:46):
geek from way back and as someone who like truly
loves print media, I just I love the fact that
magazines are kind of this uh, they've become kind of
this like niche property that really reward again people who
are obsessives and who are kind of collectors. Like It's no,
it no longer feels like a disposable medium. It feels

(01:09:08):
like this very special um, this very special place of
of discovery. And uh yeah, so that little feedback, I
think that feedback gives me, like y'all get all the
um so any thank you again so much for talking
to and also thank you for writing this book. Seriously,

(01:09:32):
it is fantastic, funny, well researched, so accessible. I highly
recommend it. Um, we were feminists once back at the table,

(01:09:55):
so again we just want to thank Andy Seisler so much,
not only for talking to us at Lady Fest, but
also for all the work that she's done, um, not
only with building Bitch, but also with being a voice
in her own right for feminism today. Um, and of
course for writing her newest book, We Were Feminists Once,

(01:10:18):
which we do highly recommend that you check out. And
while you're at it, head on over to Bitch media
dot org, where you can find all sorts of great articles,
podcast magazines that you can can bine and hold in
your hands. I'm a subscriber to Bitch magazine, so I
can personally attest to how fantastic it is to open

(01:10:40):
my mailbox and have a physical copy of Bitch in
my hand and know that I'm supporting feminist, independent media
because that's so important. I agree, and I want to
now hear from listeners who do support independent feminist media
out there. Where are our Bitch fans are Bitch subscribers?
Have you already read Andy Seisler's book? What do you

(01:11:03):
think about it? And do you have anything to add
to the fabulous insight that Andy gave us during that interview?
Let us know mom stuff at how Stuff Works dot
com is our email address. You can also tweet us
at mom Stuff podcasts, or messages on Facebook, and we've
got a couple of messages to share with you right now.

(01:11:24):
So I have a letter here from Toby in response
to our wartime prostitution episode by the name of Buffer
of Horrors. Uh. She said, I noticed that you kept
bringing up questions of whether the women involve are forced, coerced,
economically coerced, or freely choosing their work. I'm glad to
hear you recognizing the issues is not a simple yes
or new question, and if there's a lot of gray

(01:11:44):
area and how people experience doing sex work. However, this
approach tends to create a subtle implication that all sex
workers can be split into victims or empowered based on
whether sex work was their first choice career or their
only choice. The reality is that regardless of how or
why someone ends up working in the sex industry, it's
often more important to look at what working conditions were

(01:12:05):
like do you have the right to refuse a client?
Are you paid well enough to take care of your
needs even if you refuse a client? Can you take
time off and still have a job to come back
to do you have recourse against violence or do you
get arrested when you go to the police for help.
Do you have access to medical care for all your
health needs or are you only given STI checks to
protect the health of your clients. Do you have freedom

(01:12:25):
of movement or will you get arrested when you enter
or leave certain parts of a city. Many areas that
temporarily legalized prostitution would create restrictions on what parts of
town sex workers were allowed in, and today many cities
continue this with their prostitution free zones. These are concrete
issues that make a big impact on your experience of work.
Even if someone likes their job as a sex worker,

(01:12:46):
it's still pretty terrible to get kidnapped with all of
your co workers and thrown on a boat for several
months without the ability to leave or contact your friends
and family who aren't there with you. And for those
who hate their job in which they had other options,
that still is really valuable to know you can report
a client for assaulting you without getting arrested, and that
you won't get arrested if you try to leave the
red light district in your town. All valuable perspectives, So

(01:13:10):
thank you Toby so I've got a letter here from
Bird on our episode about the mis gendering of HIV
and Bird rights, your description of the New York Times
and quote unquote cancer was incorrect. Compose a sarcoma is
cancer typically found in late stage HIV and AIDS infections,
as the body can no longer fight off infection. It

(01:13:32):
leaves tell tale purple lesions all over the body. K
S was prevalent before anti retroviral treatments were accessible, and
it was a telltale sign of an HIV infection. I
work in a dermatology clinic in Beverly Hills and recently
we had a young, affluent, white, homosexual male patient come
in with KS and molascum and it was heartbreaking. The

(01:13:55):
physician I work for said, that's not how we diagnosed
AIDS anymore. That's how it was in the eighties. KS
is extremely rare now, but at one time it was
a visual marker of infection. The patient refused testing from
his primary care physician, stating he was taking care of
it somewhere else, or was getting homeopathic testing. I can't

(01:14:15):
remember exactly. I was struck by this interaction and felt
so powerless. It prompted me to speak with my mom
regarding her experience as an infectious disease physician in the
nineteen eighties. A very interesting conversation, and I'm sure she'd
be willing to speak with you all if you wanted.
I can't find a YouTube clip, but urge you all
to watch Angels in America, as KS is mentioned in

(01:14:36):
a strikingly poignant line, the wine dark kiss of the
Angel of Death. Well, thank you so much for that correction, Bird,
and thanks so much to everyone who has written into us.
Mom Stuff at how stuff works dot com is our
email address, and for links to all of our social
media as well as all of our blogs, videos, and podcasts,

(01:14:56):
head on over to stuff Mom Never Told You dot com.
For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit
how stuff works dot com.