"Consequence-free misogyny" (and four other reads)

Five things on gender (in)equality and the backlash against feminism

Dear readers old and new,

Here in London it’s not as cold as it should be for December, but it is generally grey outside. The man in my life, Maayan Madar (who writes an excellent newsletter on here, by the way), has released a new single all about the cold. I’m biased, of course, but I think it’s beautiful and hope you’ll all listen to it on repeat like me.

I’ve had a busy month since I last sent The Backlash. In November, I published a longread about the destruction of Gaza’s cities and the idea of urbicide. It was a heavy lift, practically and emotionally. Here is a link. I’ve also worked on another long piece, which is much more Backlash-related. It’s coming in the new year….

One final thing: I’ve been helping Sama Habeeb, a mother of five in Gaza, with donations for her family, through an Israeli group called Gaza Support Network. Sama’s kids have been going to school and kindergarten again with the funds she is getting from a network of donors who give monthly. You will have heard about the storm and flooding in Gaza right now. The family live in a house, luckily, but have had to do lots of fixing to stay warm and dry, given the war damage to their building. If you want to join Sama’s group of donors, take a look at this, or if you want to donate one-off to help them, here is a link. Every little bit helps and is much appreciated.

And now for the reads….

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1) Favourite new podcast alert

Not technically a read, but I may have a new favourite podcast. In Bed with the Right, with Moira Donegan and Adrian Daub, is all about sex, gender and the US right. They have an excellent episode deconstructing the great feminisation theory essay by Helen Andrews (covered last time on this very newsletter), in which they take apart what passes for her argument (that women have ruined the world) with relish. Here is a link.

I also recommend their episode on the Depp v Heard trial as a major low in the MeToo Backlash. For anyone who declared themselves Team Johnny, listen to this and eat your hat.

PS This week we published a very good piece by Toby Buckle about whether “the great feminisation” theory has made it to these shores.

2) The misogyny that is ignored

The philosopher Sasha Mudd has written about the response in the US to the Epstein files, and what this tells us about the misogyny of the Trump era. Here is a snippet:

What too few say is this: the Epstein files have returned only after more than a decade in which Donald Trump and the movement around him made the degradation of women feel ordinary and unremarkable. The near-erasure of that fact should alarm us.

And also:

This moral numbness shapes the reception of the Epstein files. The sudden outrage on behalf of Epstein’s victims — justified and long overdue — stands in stark contrast to the ongoing indifference toward the women Trump harmed. Why, after nearly a decade of excusing Trump’s violence, is the political class now insisting on justice? Why for Epstein’s victims, and not for Trump’s?

A good accompaniment to this is Sophie Gilbert’s excellent piece in The Atlantic, published following Trump’s “Quiet. Quiet, piggy” moment. It’s all about the dangers of “consequence-free misogyny”.

3) Manzanas del cuidado

Finally, something uplifting (a rarity in this newsletter!). Colombia’s capital Bogotá has pioneered a radical experiment in easing “‘time poverty’— the lack of time for anything beyond the crushing, invisible burden of unpaid care work that falls overwhelmingly on women”. For Vox, Rachel Cohen Booth reports on “manzanas del cuidado”, or care blocks, neighbourhood hubs where caregivers can access childcare and other kinds of help. She writes:

At a care block, a woman can access a variety of services while the person she cares for is looked after by teachers and staff nearby. She can hand off her laundry to an attendant, finish her schooling, meet with a lawyer, consult a psychologist, or learn job skills. The scope of activities is not limited to errands, either: she can also read a novel, catch up with friends, or just get some rest. And the system extends beyond the physical blocks — mobile buses bring comprehensive services to rural areas, and an at-home program targets caregivers who support those with severe disabilities and therefore cannot leave their houses.

Bogotá is trying to do something tricky: elevate both care work and caregivers, while also saying, “You shouldn’t have to be doing this so much — you deserve a full life beyond caring for kids, for aging relatives, for your partner.”

Apparently there might be one in the works in Greater Manchester….

4) The kind of story you’ll wish you could unknow

Glamour Magazine has a report about a form of online image abuse where men ejaculate on photos and videos of women (and sometimes for a fee). As reminders of the pervasiveness (and nastiness) of misogyny go, this is the sort that will give you vertigo. Jess Davies writes:

Once confined to the murkier corners of internet forums, this harmful behaviour has begun creeping into far more mainstream spaces. During this investigation, I turned to TikTok, hoping to find victims who had spoken publicly about their experiences. Instead, I found dozens of videos featuring men ejaculating onto images of celebrities and everyday women. A grim sexual act once confined to fringe forums has seeped onto a mainstream platform synonymous with teenagers, trends and harmless escapism.

This reminded me of Laura Bates’s very good but also dispiriting book, The New Age of Sexism, the first chapter of which is about online image abuse via deepfakes. (I reviewed the book earlier this year and Bates joined us for an episode of the Prospect Magazine podcast, which I co-host. Trigger warning for that episode).

5) “How women made the global economy”

In this lovely piece, Josie Glausiusz combines the fascinating life story of her grandmother (who, aged 14, left school and sold cherry boot polish in the East End of London) and a lecture by the historian Victoria Bateman about “how women made the global economy”, including her thoughts on tradwives. Josie writes:

I asked Bateman, at the conclusion of her Gresham College lecture, if she could comment on the tradwife movement, or “how women have throughout history also monetized domestic pursuits.” She replied, “the tradwife movement is troubling in so many ways. The tradwife has never been ‘trad,’ as I hope I’ve shown. Women throughout history have been doing all kinds of things — hunting, building pyramids, plumbing in ancient Rome; they were mining coal in the industrial revolution.”

And also: The great shrinking | WI and Girlguiding exclude trans women | rape is still effectively decriminalised

Thank you for reading, see you next time (and if you enjoyed this post, please do share and like it)