‘Galaxy Brain,’ Feminist Stand-Up and Looking Beyond the Netflix Algorithm

PUBLISHED 9/14/2026 by

“I’ve prepared a lot. I’m taking this very seriously, because it’s still very rare for women to get Netflix specials. I had to have sex with so many executives over there.”

So begins comedian Mary Beth Barone’s new Netflix special, Galaxy Brain, with a joke about just how exceptional a woman apparently has to be to reach one of comedy’s biggest platforms.

A recent New York Times article, “Feminist Stand-Up Was Once Ascendant. Can Mary Beth Barone Revive It?” paints a picture of a stand-up scene that’s left women behind: one dominated by deliberately confrontational, anti-“politically correct” comedy and Netflix Top 10 lists littered with right-wing darlings like Tony Hinchcliffe and Andrew Schulz. 

Barone’s joke points to a real disparity in who receives the industry’s most visible opportunities. Women account for only a quarter of Netflix’s stand-up specials in 2026. And among 2025’s 10 highest-grossing comedy tours, Nikki Glaser’s Alive and Unwell was the only one headlined by a woman. 

But asking whether Barone can “revive” feminist stand-up mistakes limited mainstream visibility for an absence of feminist comedy. Women—particularly Black women, queer women and other performers pushed outside the industry’s center—have helped shape stand-up from its beginnings.

After Sept. 11, the U.S. Press Corps Chose Patriotism Over Scrutiny

PUBLISHED 9/11/2026 by

(This article originally appeared in the December 2001/January 2002 issue of Ms. magazine.)

A free, independent and critical press is never more crucial than in wartime, when millions of lives and the course of history can turn on small bits of information.

But since the Sept. 11 attacks, corporate media outlets have been busy doing what News Corp owner Rupert Murdoch called their “patriotic duty”: waving the flag, toeing the government’s line, and ceding their major editorial judgment calls to Condoleezza Rice and other administration bigwigs. These insiders have pressured news executives to suppress information ranging from Al Qaeda statements and security details to public health data available under the Freedom of Information Act.

Robin Morgan’s ‘Fighting Words’ for the Work Ahead

PUBLISHED 9/8/2026 by

For more than half a century, Robin Morgan helped shape feminist thought and activism in the United States and around the world. She also designed the now-iconic symbol of the women’s movement: the female symbol combined with a raised fist.

In her own unforgettable words, the pioneering feminist writer, poet and longtime Ms. editor reflects on power, progress, women’s leadership and the fight ahead.

For Gloria Steinem, Women’s Liberation Meant Men’s Liberation, Too

PUBLISHED 9/7/2026 by

Since her death, social media has lit up with heartfelt stories and testimonies, mostly from women, about Gloria’s impact on their lives. When men have weighed in with expressions of gratitude, it’s often been to thank her for helping to create a world in which their mothers, wives and daughters had a much better shot at pursuing their dreams.

For the record, this “better world” for women has been a tremendous boon for men and boys, too. And what has largely been missing from men’s grateful accounts of Gloria Steinem’s good works are the ways in which her leadership contributed directly to improvements in men’s lives.

She did this, in part, by using her platform to articulate—in a very public way—the idea that patriarchal culture was damaging not only to women, but also to men of every ethnic and racial background and sexual orientation.

Gloria Steinem was also one of the first prominent feminists to express empathy for men—like me—who struggled with the question of what it means to be a strong man who supports gender justice and wants men to lead more connected and authentic lives.

Rest in Power, Robin Morgan—Ms. Editor, Poet, Feminist and Architect of the Women’s Movement

PUBLISHED 9/5/2026 by

Longtime Ms. editor and “architect of the contemporary women’s movement,” Robin Morgan died peacefully in her sleep on Sept. 5, 2026, just days after her friend and feminist partner Gloria Steinem.

Morgan called Ms. “a real family,” citing the depth and longevity of the relationships many people established through it. She would go on to found the Women’s Media Center alongside Ms. cofounder Gloria Steinem and actor and activist Jane Fonda in 2005.

“Robin Morgan was one of the architects of the contemporary women’s movement,” said Julie Burton, president and CEO of the Women’s Media Center. “Her global leadership for justice and equality, her work as a pioneering journalist who gave voice and visibility to women, and her fierce artistry as an internationally recognized poet and author of more than 20 books—these all constitute the legacy she has forged over decades of creative, cultural, and political work. 

Rest in Power: Gloria Steinem, Ms. Cofounder and Feminist Visionary

PUBLISHED 9/3/2026 by

Gloria Steinem, the journalist, organizer and cofounder of Ms. whose name became inseparable from the modern movement for women’s equality, died Wednesday, Sept. 2, at her home in New York City. She was 92.

In 2001, Gloria came to Ellie Smeal and me to discuss the possibility of the Feminist Majority Foundation taking on the publication of Ms. She had rescued the magazine from a series of commercial publishers that had nearly killed it, and it was now facing the headwinds of a rapidly changing media landscape.

We understood, we were being entrusted with far more than a publication—we were being asked to preserve an independent feminist institution, and to keep it alive, questioning and relevant for generations.

That responsibility is more urgent today than at any time in recent memory.

Gloria understood from the beginning that feminism needed its own media—not because feminists should withdraw from the larger public conversation, but because independent media can introduce truths the mainstream has not yet learned to recognize.

Gloria Steinem changed the story women were permitted to tell about themselves. Now it is our responsibility to keep telling the truth.

September 2026 Reads for the Rest of Us

PUBLISHED 9/1/2026 by

Hello, feminist reader friends! Each month, I provide Ms. readers with a list of new books being published by writers from historically excluded groups. The aims of these lists are threefold:

I want to do my part in the disruption of what has been the acceptable “norm” in the book world for far too long—white, cis, heterosexual, male;

I want to amplify indie publishers and amazing works by writers who are women, Black, Indigenous, Latinx, APIA/AAPI, international, queer, trans, nonbinary, disabled, fat, immigrant, Muslim, neurodivergent, sex-positive or of other historically marginalized identities—you know, the rest of us; and

I want to challenge and encourage you all to buy, borrow and read them! 

This month, it’s back to school and back to heavy book-publishing schedules. I can’t wait for you to check out the 15 other books I’m recommending this month. So get to it.  

Dispatches From Daisy Chain: Olivia Rodrigo’s Feminist Festival Brought Together Music, Reproductive Freedom and the Power of Women

PUBLISHED 9/1/2026 by

On Saturday, Aug. 29, more than 45,000 music fans traveled to Irvine, Calif., for the first-ever Daisy Chain Fields music festival, organized and headlined by Olivia Rodrigo, where 100 percent of the proceeds went to organizations supporting women and girls. Under the sweltering SoCal sun, an all-women lineup—including sets from Mitski, Doechii, Garbage, Chappell Roan and others—fundraised for 10 nonprofits: Baby2Baby, Black Mamas Matter Alliance, Center for Reproductive Rights, FreeFrom, Jhpiego, Johns Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health, National Domestic Workers Alliance, National Institute for Reproductive Health National Women’s Law Center and Planned Parenthood.

The all-day festival, inspired by Sarah McLachlan’s Lilith Fair of the 1990s, raised $10 million in ticket sales. Then, during her set at the end of the day, Rodrigo announced (to massive applause) that Melinda French Gates was matching every dollar raised—bringing the festival’s total donation to $20 million for diverse nonprofits supporting sexual and reproductive health, children in need, Black mothers, gender-based violence survivors, Indigenous communities and more.

I was lucky enough to go to Daisy Chain Fields and cover the festival for Ms. In the “Daisy Chain Reaction Village,” I spoke with several of the organizations that will receive Daisy Chain Fields funds.

“We wanted to come to the festival because we feel really passionately about connecting with new audiences on the issue of reproductive rights, particularly younger audiences who may not be as aware or knowledgeable about the national and international state of reproductive rights and bodily autonomy,” said Esme Lowe from the Center for Reproductive Rights. “It’s just super exciting because we’re engaging with people we might not [otherwise] even get to talk to.”

In line outside the Daisy Chain Reaction Village, sisters Madison and Mackenzie Wong said they were excited to attend the festival in their home city of Irvine, and happy to see a lot of younger fans of Olivia Rodrigo there to learn about the causes Daisy Chain Fields was supporting. 

“I think it’s important for big artists who have a platform to use their voice,” Mackenzie said. “They have so much influence anyway, so no matter what they say, it’s going to have a broader impact.”

Was Mary Oliver a Feminist? 

PUBLISHED 8/29/2026 by

From Pinterest boards to classroom walls, Mary Oliver’s words have become popular in a way that most poets could only dream. People have even gone as far as to call her “Saint Mary.”

But in a new documentary Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World, director and producer Sasha Waters presents Oliver with complexity, hoping that more people will read her poetry with the poet behind it in mind.

“I think there’s also this way in which she becomes a little flattened and one-dimensional through the way that she circulates now,” says Waters. “Understanding that she was very much a complicated person and woman until the end of her life is what I hope people take away from her.”

Dolly Parton’s Unique Feminist Power, as Told by Gloria Steinem (January 1987)

PUBLISHED 8/27/2026 by

(As the world mourns Dolly Parton, Ms. is revisiting Gloria Steinem’s tribute to the country music legend, originally published in the January 1987 issue, when Parton was named one of Ms. magazine’s Women of the Year. Steinem celebrated Parton not only as a gifted songwriter and magnetic performer, but as a shrewd businessperson who transformed femininity into a source of humor and power—and used her success to lift up working women, poor communities and the mountain people of her native Tennessee.)

If feminism means each of us finding our unique power, and helping other women do the same, Dolly Parton certainly has done both.

Her strength and capacity to dream seems to have been born into Dolly, as one of 12 children of a poor family in those mountains.

By the time she was 7, she was playing the guitar, reading books and dreaming of a world beyond the poverty and beauty of the Smoky Mountains.

By the time she was 10, she had coaxed support from her free-thinking mother, braved the opposition of her protective father, and earned her first public applause by singing before live audiences at a radio station in Knoxville. With that taste of success, she vowed to conquer the larger world beyond the mountains, but never to betray the country way of life that had nurtured her.