Feminist Highlights | Dissent Magazine

Happy Birthday, Pauline

Charles Taylor ▪ June 19, 2019

Pauline Kael was one of the great voices of American freedom. The road she opened for critics is simultaneously the most rewarding and the most difficult to follow.

What Men Want

Charlotte Shane ▪ Spring 2019

Andrea Dworkin insisted her writing was about women, but it was about men: what they do, why they do it, and which lies they use in their defense. Women couldn’t be subjects, only faceless victims.

Seizing the Means of Reproduction

Emily Callaci ▪ Summer 2018

Unrecognized, often unpaid, and yet utterly necessary, reproductive labor is everywhere in our lives. Can it form the basis for a renewed radical politics?

Belabored Podcast #160: When One Job Isn’t Enough

Sarah Jaffe and Michelle Chen ▪ September 21, 2018

In cities across the country, Marriott hotel workers are forced to work second jobs to pay the bills. We talk with two worker-organizers planning to strike for a fairer contract.

Mommy Issues: Reconsidering The Mermaid and the Minotaur

Charlotte Shane ▪ Summer 2018

Forty years after its original publication, Dorothy Dinnerstein’s classic study of motherhood still provides a moving portrait of the currents running under interactions between men and women.

No More Miss America: A Collective Memory of Liberatory Action

Laura Tanenbaum and Mark Engler ▪ September 7, 2018

Fifty years ago, a protest against the Miss America pageant kicked off a new phase of the women’s liberation movement. We present a narrative history of that landmark protest, as told by the participants themselves.

Trump’s Border Crackdown Threatens Women the Most

Michelle Chen ▪ July 3, 2018

The Trump administration may have put a hold on separating families. But it is pushing through a range of other measures to keep migrants out—not least women fleeing violence and persecution.

The Collective Power of #MeToo

Sarah Jaffe ▪ Spring 2018

Now we know the issue that unites women across workplaces is abuse by more powerful men, how do we come up with demands that move beyond naming and shaming?

Talking Back to the Patriarchy

Ann Snitow ▪ Spring 2018

It is in the interest of women of all generations to invent a complex, resistant, and sexually curious strain in feminist thought and action. History can show us how.