Originally appeared on World’s Most Famous Man. Republished here with permission. So let me just get two things out of the way before I get really, really deep in detail about one specific aspect of the Oscars intro Sunday night: 1) It was super, super-long and self-indulgent. Even by Oscar standards. It was like half […]
Michele Gazzolo offers her take on the Oscar host’s night of offensive jokes. Seth MacFarlane. Until last night I had never seen him. He sang a passable song or two, and fit the tuxedo nicely. He reminded me of some boys I’d known in college who called each other Biff and Scooter. He reminded me […]
This originally appeared on Alternet.org. Republished here with permission. When I first gave birth and brought my baby girl home, I aspired to be the ultimate earth-mother-Gaia-worshipping-priestess from another dimension. Those first few weeks with my child I thought I had transcended all trivialities and was officially crowned the “New Age Queen of the Now.” […]
Many women still see the cleanliness of their home as a direct reflection of them personally. This year for Christmas I was given a thoughtful and generous gift by one of my best friends: a gift certificate for a full house cleaning by a professional maid service. I have rarely received a gift that filled […]
Milestones like getting married and having kids used to clearly mark someone’s transition to adulthood, but not anymore. Conventionally, the “transition to adulthood” is defined by five milestones: “completing school, leaving home, becoming financially independent, marrying, and having a child.” It’s a reflexive classification that once had a firm stronghold on how we moved through […]
Angi Becker Stevens desperately wanted to be one of the boys growing up, and eventually realized that her entire self-worth was dependent on boys’ opinions of her. As I remember it, I spent my early childhood in a refreshingly gender-neutral manner; I was equally fond of Legos and Barbies, Matchbox cars and model trains and […]
Annamarya Scaccia shares her recent discovery that she does, in fact, want to have a child, and her anxiety about how motherhood will change her. “So I’m going to tell you something that may freak you out.” I swing around in my computer chair and look at my partner of eight years as he lounges […]
This originally appeared on The Daily Life. Republished here with permission. Every time I praise my daughter for being a “good girl,” I cringe inside. It falls out of my mouth without thinking, as if it’s the highest praise that can be bestowed upon a girl. But it’s not. It’s a curse and it has the potential to follow […]
The only way to affect real change for mothers in our country is to stop calling motherhood a career, says Danielle Vermeer. One of the best pieces of marriage (and life) advice I ever received was from my mentor in college. She explained how in an intimate relationship like marriage, you should define and redefine […]
Despite many critics claiming Beyonce’s halftime show was overly sexual, Emily Heist Moss was thrilled by the performance, and says owning your sexuality and being sexualized are two different things. After Beyonce’s epic halftime extravaganza, the Internet temporarily became a platform exclusively designed to facilitate massive amounts of Bey-love. From the First Lady to Justin […]
When a man shares intimate details of his past sexual partners with you, he’s contributing to the objectification of women, and unless you tell him to stop, so are you, says Cara Hoffman. I once dated a man who felt compelled to share the intimate details of the last few relationships he’d had. This included […]
Contrary to the stereotype, feminists can take a compliment, but only if it comes with no strings attached, says Emily Heist Moss. After my piece on street harassment, “A Letter to the Guy Who Harassed Me Outside the Bar,” a number of commenters wondered if I was, in my plea for empathy and understanding, condemning […]
