Focusing on other consequences of overturning of Roe v. Wade makes us forget that the Supreme Court’s decision is really about misogyny.
Author: Laurie Essig
Laurie Essig is a professor of gender studies at Middlebury College and the author of several books, including Queer in Russia: A Story of Sex, Self, and the Other.
Pro-War Rhetoric Around Ukraine Perpetuates the Patriarchy and Plays Right Into Putin’s Hands
Watching cable news coverage of the tragic events in Ukraine, I hear again and again how brave the Ukrainian men who are staying to fight are. But we should be very careful about who we worship because fetishizing the masculinist and militarist response of war will hurt women and LGBTQ people for decades to come.
Putin is a madman, but his regime depends on these century-old notions of binary gender and “normal” sexuality. The way the U.S. mainstream media is covering the illegal invasion of Ukraine is doing similar cultural work.
Megxit and The Death of Fairytale Romance
If Meghan, the lucky girl who rode off with handsome Prince Harry, says that she’d prefer to earn her own money and live her own life, thank you very much, how can any of us find solace in the promise romance makes us?
The Men Are Not Alright
The problem is not mental illness. The problem is not violent video games. The problem is a social pathology of aggrieved entitlement and misogyny mixed with white supremacy, aided and abetted by 8Chan and Fox News and Donald Trump and corrupted lawmakers.
Wishing You a Radical Wedding Season
The deep existential dread I feel this time of year might be well-reasoned. Maybe the world really is going to hell in a hand-basket. Or maybe it’s wedding season.
Resistance Over Romance
It’s hard to have sex when your future is far from secure. Just ask the young people who aren’t having it.
Radical Romance: Examining Our Disruptive Affection for AOC
I felt a heart-warming spark of hope as I stamped my frozen feet this January in New York City, awaiting my beloved Ocasio Cortez at the 2019 Women’s March. Maybe we have finally wiped the fairy dust out of our eyes. Maybe we have started building a future that is not about our own individual love stories, but our love for humanity and our love for the Earth.
Brett Kavanaugh and the Creation of the Rapist
In the wake of the #MeToo movement—not to mention 50 years of feminist theory, legal intervention and activism—we have finally named the rapist, the workplace harasser, the serial jerk who ignores consent. And that leaves us with a few questions which we can never fully answer.
A Mass Lesbian Wedding at the End of the World
The last time I felt hope was on a hot summer day in Provincetown.
Gender Studies Will Destroy (Save) the World!
The global rise of highly masculinist and misogynist—not to mention homophobic, white supremacist and just plain scary—regimes has granted gender studies a lot of attention. And boy, oh boy, do all the misogynists have their knickers in a twist.