In case you missed them, I did two big posts recently. The challenges and dangers of confronting aggressive men in front of other people. Taylor Swift wants you to think she’s a victim, Miley wants you to think she’s a good girl, and the Game of Thrones showrunners want you to rubber-stamp all their worst…
feminism
Caught on Camera: Halle, Taylor, and Me
Taylor Swift announced on Wednesday that her sixth studio album, coming out November 10, will be called Reputation. That got me thinking that if I were a pop star dropping a new album, the most appropriate name for it would be Procrastination. I could schedule my album for the 10th of Never. A post shared…
RIP, Ms. Sheila Michaels
Sheila Michaels — the woman responsible for popularizing the honoric “Ms.” as a substitute for “Mrs.” or Miss” — died last month of leukemia at age 78. As her New York Times obituary by Margalit Fox notes, Michaels didn’t invent “Ms.,” nor did she claim to. The abbreviation appeared in a Massachusetts newspaper in 1901,…
RIP, French Feminist Icon Simone Veil
Simone Veil, an Auschwitz survivor who became a lawyer and then a much-admired feminist politician in France, died yesterday at the age of 89. Embed from Getty Images As France’s health minister in the 1970s, she pushed through laws that lifted restrictions on contraception and legalized abortion. During the National Assembly’s debate over abortion, “phrases…
Recommended Reading: Letters to Democrats
Buzzfeed has published a wonderful story by Ruby Cramer called “The Place Where Letters To Hillary Clinton Go.” It’s about 30-year-old Rob Russo, who is in charge of Hillary Clinton’s political and personal correspondence. He’s drafted 110,000 letters for her since 2008, and it looks like he’ll double that number eventually, because, since Election Day,…
Throwback Thursday: When Havoc Struck
As I’ve said before, there are fascinating stories to be found in the obituary sections of newspapers. I’m specifying “newspapers,” rather than the “news,” because if you’re not physically turning the pages of a print edition, it’s easy to miss anyone whose death doesn’t make the homepage of a website or the top of a…
Wendy Brandes Jewelry in the New York Times
Thanks to super-cool journalist Rachel Garrahan for including me in her New York Times article called “In a Time of Stress, Jewelry Becomes Armor”! It’s about how women are gravitating towards jewelry that makes them feel strong … and it just so happens that the concept of female strength is at the very heart of…
Recommended Reading for Women’s Health Week
Mother’s Day marked the start of National Women’s Health Week, duly accompanied by a statement full of lies from the Pussy Grabber in Chief. The connection of National Women’s Health Week to Mother’s Day rubs me the wrong way, because what does it mean? Only mothers are women? Or is it that women’s health should…
If You Must Fly United, Remember Nan Kempner
United Airlines got itself into a world of trouble yesterday over leggings after an alert (female) observer tweeted that two teenage girls were barred from a flight because of their leggings, while a younger girl was forced to put a dress over her leggings in order to board. The social-media genius at United decided leggings…
ANZA Gems and International Women’s Day
Today is officially International Women’s Day for most of us, but every day is International Women’s Day at ANZA Gems. As I’ve written before, ANZA was founded in 2014 by my friend Monica Stephenson of the jewelry blog iDazzle in order to offer a transparent journey from the gem mine to the customer. To do…