Magazine
Everlasting Love: Why Courtney Love still matters
Illustration by Andrea Tsurumi
I recently overheard a media colleague say, “I don’t get Lena Dunham. She’s no Courtney Love.” My ears perked up because I’m nosy, but also, huh? “When Courtney Love was 26 and you talked to her,” my colleague went on to... Read more »
Mass Market: Two Latina authors plot a feminist takeover of chick-lit
“You bitches are lucky to have a health clinic,” one of the girls said.“Hold up, ladies,” Marisol said. “Remember, you are not bitches,” she said. “You are hoes.”The women laughed.“Bitches are dogs,” Marisol said. “But whores are... Read more »
Against the Ropes: For women boxers, it's a fight just to get in the ring
Photos are from Women Boxers: The New Warriors, by Delilah Montoya.
More than a decade before Maureen “Moe” Shea was Hilary Swank’s sparring partner in Million Dollar Baby, she was struggling just to get a jab in. “There were gyms that closed the door in my face,” says... Read more »
Precious Mettle: The myth of the strong black woman
In a society that finds little to praise in black women, other groups’ appreciation for perceived black female strength can feel like a reductive appreciation. Strength becomes one of few positive adjectives black women can own.
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Craving the Other: One woman's beef with cultural appropriation and food
For a long time, Vietnamese food made me uncomfortable. It was brothy, weirdly fishy, and full of the gross animal parts that other people didn’t seem to want. It was too complicated.
I wanted the straightforward, prefabricated snacks that I saw on television: Bagel Bites, Pop-Tarts, chicken... Read more »
Safe Words: The history of anti-abuse activism in BDSM
This article appears in our 2013 Fall issue, Gray. Subscribe today!
For years I would jokingly explain to my confused, nonkinky friends that the site FetLife “is just Facebook for us perverts.” Then, in the summer of 2012, I began seeing FetLife’s name in the headlines of blogs that for the... Read more »
Rise of the Penis Piñata: The big business of bachelorette parties.
Image via venassa
A few weeks ago, I attended a friend's bachelorette party. In the days preceding, my kitchen morphed into a workshop dedicated to constructing penis-shaped objects to eat and to hit. Resting atop my kitchen table like a prize pig at a state fair was a large pink papier-mâché... Read more »
Gaming the System: Are women-led games D.O.A.?
“'We had [some companies] tell us, 'Well, we don't want to publish it because that's not going to succeed. You can't have a female character in games. It has to be a male character, simple as that.'”
That's what game developer Jean-Max Morris was told when he tried to... Read more »
Artist Statement: Don't call Favianna Rodriguez a political artist.
When I saw images of artist Favianna Rodriguez's “Slut Power” series circulating on Facebook, I was already familiar with her bold silkscreened posters, which often feature people of color tackling subjects as varied as immigration and sustainability. The Slut Power posters, however,... Read more »
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