Is marriage sex work?

A polarizing internet debate! Also: critical hedonism, a viral bad dad, Martha Stewart's affair double-standard, 'Lean In' feminism, and more in the weekend roundup.

Photo: Sandy Millar

I went on KQED’s Forum this week to talk about the decade-on legacy of Lean In, jumping off the release of a new report on women in the workplace. The findings of that report: not so great. There have been great gains, and yet women’s workplace experiences are in many ways “the same or worse than ten years ago.”

Not at all surprising.

My take is this: Lean In, and the promotional machine around it, used the language of feminism while selling women tools for excelling within a rigged system. Instead of putting pressure on the system to change, it put pressure on individual women to navigate systemic inequality in the workplace.

In my corner of the world, the book has become a convenient shorthand for referring to the mainstream, commercial, and corporate vision of feminism that took off in the 2010s. This style of “Lean In feminism” takes an individualistic and neoliberal approach to “empowerment.” It sells women on that myth that you can navigate your way out of oppression.

Of course, feminism has historically been a movement interested in social justice and systemic change. Empowerment was originally about collective liberation, as opposed to individual power. These days, there are traces of that style of thinking all sorts of places, from decentering men to hetero-exceptionalism.

Anyway, give a listen to the episode.

To the links!

Is marriage sex work? The writer Chidera Eggerue went viral this week by emphatically arguing that it is. There is some flattened nuance and a whole lot of traditional gendered generalizations happening in this conversation, but the argument itself is very, very old.