The Witches Are Coming

Art didn’t invent oppressive gender roles, racial stereotyping, or rape culture, but it reflects, polishes, and sells them back to us every moment of our waking lives. We make art and it makes us, simultaneously. Shouldn’t it follow, then, that we can change ourselves by changing what we make? The movement can’t just disrupt the culture; it has to

There’s a type of person who thinks he’s getting away with something by not believing in anything. But not believing in anything is believing in something. It’s active, not passive. To believe in nothing is to change nothing. It means you’re endorsing the present, and the present is a horror. And why wouldn’t a couple of straight white millionaire

Everything is a product of its time, and the whole point of progress is to make the future better than the present. People make mistakes, and people grow, and culture grows along with them.

You don’t have to “hear both sides” perpetually—you can hear them once or twice, make a decision, and move on into the future.

A few creepy men losing their jobs, a few women managing to clamber to the top—those things matter, but they don’t actually change how people think and behave on a large scale. Fuck, they don’t even change how people think and behave on a small scale toward those individual men and women.

Those who believe that straight white men have a mandate to burn the rest of us as fuel, to sell us for parts, to mow us down and climb up the pile, never truly conceded that war. They have been biding their time, and this is their last great gambit. But I live in the America that won—the America with art and empathy and a free press and fierce pro

So no, excuse me, we will not play likability anymore. It’s an endless runner—a game with no progress and no finish line—that women are expected to chase, that keeps us from doing the real work, accruing the real power. Chasing likability has been one of women’s biggest setbacks, by design. I don’t know that rejecting likability will get us anywher

media is so strong. Media overpowers our conscious minds, no matter how hard we try to hang on—our knowledge of what is right, who has an agenda, what we are really worth. Marketing is powerful and beauty culture is powerful and men’s control of the narrative is powerful and a lot of people are making a lot of money teaching us that we live in an u

“Joan felt so hurt by the world,” Guy told me. “She felt so certain that she didn’t have what it takes to be respected, and she was going to point out everyone else’s inadequacies because she was sure that hers were very evident.”