Your April Love Letter
There's a lot of good out there. The magic in books (Yesteryear!), art, friends, protest, and being a mess in public--from past month.
Hello new readers! If you like what you see, the best way to support us is with a paid subscription, starting at just over $4.
Monthly roundup posts are a paid subscriber benefit—we are lifting the paywall today so you can see what it’s about. A paid sub gives you access to all our content AND lets you be part of something that Pete Hegseth would hate for just over $4. Win!
Welcome to our regular roundup of things we can’t stop thinking about!
These posts are meant to be a little bit of respite from the weight of living through…all the things that we are now witnessing. It’s a lot of things!
And every month when Lane reminds me of this, I realize that I have once again gathered a series of links highlighting even more terrible things about Pete Hegseth. It is quite a time to be alive, no doubt, but I am also a person more likely to watch a documentary about the impacts of pharmaceuticals in our drinking water (important!) than an uproarious romcom. Which is why I am lucky to be able to rely on my friends to lift me up. So these links come mostly courtesy of friends and loved ones — the people on whom I rely to lighten the load (and my mood).
First up, this interview about a new book of essays by professional clowns, sent to me by the brilliant Carla Zanoni.
Anyone who has known me for more than a minute knows that I am obsessed with court jesters, buffoons and clowns of all kinds. This essay collection asks the very rational question: Do you really want to be functional in a totally dysfunctional world?”
Clowns can perform overwhelming sorrow and incredible joy. They are fearless in sharing their darkest, most complex feelings. When they make fun of someone, they start with themselves. Hopefully, we all also love ourselves enough to see the full, complex picture of our own humanity.
“The clown is a failure who’s silly about it,” the book’s editor says. “I love the idea of the figure who does the reckless thing to see what happens, or speaks truth to power. It’s humor that protects him from being murdered by the king.”
The interview also includes this sort of weird, but I think telling, clip of Hillary Clinton interviewing the now-deceased famous French clown Philippe Gaulier. Clinton asks him what the difference is for women and men in comedy. Can they do the same thing, she asks? “Comedy is ok,” he replies in his heavy French accent. “But clown is more difficult.”
Being a clown is too risky for women, he says. Women feel like they have to be charming all the time. They aren’t allowed to be jesters – or monsters. “If you are a young boy, and you come home with dirty clothing your mother will still love you,” he explains by way of example. If you’re a girl who is a mess, “it’s not certain that your father will still love you.” Uff.
Women just can’t be a mess in public — which is what it takes to be a truly great clown. This clip made the rounds making fun of Clinton’s intensity in interviewing a 100-year-clown, but I found it incredibly poignant to see how seriously she thinks about how women are — and aren’t — allowed to screw up.
Just to BRIEFLY go back to Pete Hegseth, I just can’t get out of my head what Lane so brilliantly calls “patriarchal opportunism.” It’s a phenomenon I haven’t been able to unsee since she first described it: the insidious fact that male power and status are derived from the denigration of women, and the disturbing reality of the women who think they can claw some power from that system.
The concept ties right into this recent piece from the NYT: The Women Who Believe That Women Should Lose the Right to Vote. It’s a short profile of a small church in Prescott, Arizona, that espouses “biblical patriarchy,” which demands women’s general subservience to men and a belief in the idea that “America would be better off if women could not vote.”
It’s a strange little story: It gives a very large platform to a church of 100 people, and it glosses over the fact that person who popularized this idea of biblical patriarchy had to leave his position at of Vision Forum Ministries because of what the Times called “an infidelity scandal” (He had an affair with his kids’ babysitter).
The story also doesn’t mention that a small but powerful minority of the Republican Party have also openly questioned women’s right to vote, including Hegseth and a handful of Trump appointees and supporters. (Back in 2016, when polling showed that Trump would win the election if women didn’t vote, the hashtag #repealthe19th – as in the 19th Amendment – went viral.)
And this rise in Christian Nationalism and support for biblical patriarchy by powerful people comes as Trump is pushing the SAVE Act, which would create voting restrictions that disproportionately affect women who change their names, trans people, and the approximately 50% of Americans who don’t have passports.
But….just when I’m overwhelmed by the drumbeat of patriarchal opportunism, my kid starts listening to the soundtrack to Suffs, and I am back to weeping over the incredible power and legacy of women fighting to be recognized as human.
Tiktok failed to load.Enable 3rd party cookies or use another browser
And there are always voices making it clear that there is another way. I keep thinking about this gem of an interview about Black feminism, fighting American patriarchy and racism, and imagining other futures into existence, with the brilliant writer Anna Malaika Tubbs.
Another great example: this essay by the feminist philosopher Kate Manne: Friends Don’t Let Friends Ignore Their Husband’s Red Flags.
Why don’t women speak up sooner when our friends are clearly involved with men who are truly terrible? How about cutting the cord when we first realize that he’s just a giant drag?
Let’s rethink this, Manne argues. Yes, there’s a strong and unspoken rule that we’re not allowed to say anything negative about our friend’s partners. But we also used to let our friends drive drunk. And then, eventually, the risks became too great to ignore. People started saying friends don’t let friends drive drunk.
Manne writes: “For women who choose to partner with men, they represent our biggest statistical risk to our health, happiness, safety, and emotional well-being.”
She offers helpful conversations starters to make it less awkward—read the full post here. Talk about a friend having your back!
Finally, just this morning my brilliant friend (and tenured feminist historian of medieval Europe), sent me this piece: Don’t Use A.I. to Do This.
The whole thing is brilliant but here are just a few select quotes:
Studies show that overreliance on these digital tools causes cognitive decline, but if current events are any indication, nobody’s making much of a contribution anyway. Go ahead and use A.I. however you like.
Except art. If you use it for your art, you’re a freakin’ hack.
Why is it that the most vocal cheerleaders of generative A.I. are always the hackiest motherfreakers around? You expect studio executives to say things like “it’s going to revolutionize content,” and “from a bottom-line standpoint it’s inevitable,” and “I’ve finally found an instrument as cold and empty as myself,” but you’d hope that an artist would have more self-respect.
And here are a couple items from Lane Anderson, and a request:
I am currently obsessed with the tradwife satire novel “Yesteryear” by caro claire burke. I’m about two-thirds the way through it and it’s all I can do to not just stay up all night reading it. I also have a half-dozen sticky notes fanning out of it, because it’s one of those books that I NEED TO DISCUSS and unpack. We had a little discussion about it in the MR chat yesterday, and decided that’s what we’re gonna do!
If you’re interested in jumping on a Yesteryear discussion post, lmk how much lead time you think you’ll need by choosing from the dates below.
I could honestly do it as soon as possible! But I’m flexible.
(Yesteryear has had like two reviews in the Times already but they are paywalled, but I just found this brilliant convo in LitHub between Caro and the amazing Sara Petersen —the ultimate source on all tradwife discourse! Also: here’s the publisher’s page if you need more info.)
Other good things lately: No Kings happened on a crisp and sunny day in NYC and the turnout did not disappoint. My favorite part was marching with a tween girl with her own homemade sign, and people of all ages—families with little kids and septuagenarians alike—with their homemade signs. Why are homemade signs just the best?? It’s like a big, creative, deeply-felt collective craft project.
But this collection of Heated Rivalry-themed No Kings signs killed me. Inspo for next time!! (Sent to me by my pal and reader, Maggie, who is indeed a fellow Angry American Wolf Bird—iykyk).
If you like this post, please hit the heart and give it a like or restack it. It’s the best way for new readers to find our work—thank you!
THANK YOU for being a paid subscriber. It makes our work possible—and pays us for what we do, which is the best.
I love the beginning to this so much--living through this time period is overwhelming and it all just comes in so rapid-fire that we don't even have time to react (which is the point). Also, I find such solace and joy in my friends and loved ones and the things that I enjoy--bc it's still our one wild and precious life, y'know? Thanks for acknowledging that!
Also this clown thing just blew me away. LOVED it. And Suffs!!