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

It seems that a lot of men are confusing being asked not to violate other people’s sexual boundaries with being forbidden to participate in basic human activities such as dancing, dating, chatting, walking around, going to work, and telling jokes.

Our propensity for always, always, always choosing what is comfortable over what is right helped pave the road to this low and surreal moment in US history.

There are pieces of pop culture that you outgrow because you get older. Then there are pieces of pop culture that you outgrow because you get better. Or

Why do I like this? Where is this impulse coming from? Am I telling the truth to myself about myself?

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.

Virality is compartmentalization, turning the complexities of life into decontextualized snapshots.

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.

“Just a joke” is context dependent. Certain topics, such as rape, can be “just a joke” to some, but to others they require a degree of self-negation far beyond any reasonable cost-benefit analysis.