Latest / Stuff Mom Never Told You / SMNTY Classics: Bitch Magazine

Transcript

SMNTY Classics: Bitch Magazine · Stuff Mom Never Told You

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha. I'm looking to stuff
0:07
Speaker 1: I never told your production if I high Radio Well.
0:19
Speaker 1: I wanted to bring this classic back because I feel
0:24
Speaker 1: like during our recent zine slash Fanzine episode, which was
0:30
Speaker 1: really fun, it was that some of you were probably
0:34
Speaker 1: shouting at us and specifically me during that episode that
0:39
Speaker 1: we didn't mention this topic because I sort of lamented, like, oh,
0:43
Speaker 1: big companies are coming in and they're trying to look
0:47
Speaker 1: like zines. Um capitalism ruins everything, which but there have
0:53
Speaker 1: been examples of zines that went on to become full
0:56
Speaker 1: fledged magazines and we're pretty successful. And one of them
0:59
Speaker 1: was Bitch Magazine. UM Yes, which I did not read
1:04
Speaker 1: growing up. I think I was kind of young for it,
1:07
Speaker 1: but it closed. It shut down in June two due
1:12
Speaker 1: to financial reasons. We were lucky enough me and Bridget
1:18
Speaker 1: to talk to uh Andy Zeisler of Bitch Magazine. Uh
1:24
Speaker 1: And if you'll forgive me listening to this one, this
1:26
Speaker 1: was when I was very new as a hosted that
1:28
Speaker 1: mom never told you, so please be be patient with
1:32
Speaker 1: me because I was also very nervous. But I thought
1:36
Speaker 1: we would bring this one back and sort of live
1:39
Speaker 1: in those memories, so please enjoy. Hey, this is Bridget
1:47
Speaker 1: and this is Annie, and you're listening the stuff mom
1:49
Speaker 1: never told you. So some of you all might have
2:02
Speaker 1: listened to my good friend Annie's first official Sminty episode
2:06
Speaker 1: as a co host, all about bad feminism, our feminism,
2:10
Speaker 1: how we became feminists, And honestly, I was so inspired
2:14
Speaker 1: Annie by your poignant sharing of your kind of sometimes
2:18
Speaker 1: a bumpy journey to feminism. Yeah, very kind of bumpy.
2:24
Speaker 1: And I was very honestly shy to tell that story
2:29
Speaker 1: and come out swinging of the gate I'm a bad feminist.
2:33
Speaker 1: But the response from everyone has been so great and
2:37
Speaker 1: so welcoming, and I really appreciate it, and thank you
2:40
Speaker 1: Bridget for convincing me like you've got to do this. Um,
2:44
Speaker 1: it's just it's nice to share that with listeners, that
2:48
Speaker 1: this kind of journey that we're all making mistakes in
2:51
Speaker 1: and trying to be better in, and this community that
2:54
Speaker 1: helps us all hopefully get better at being feminist even
2:59
Speaker 1: if we are still making mistakes. Definitely, well one that's
3:03
Speaker 1: sort of our kind of semi motto for the show,
3:06
Speaker 1: learning and growing together. But I think the response that
3:10
Speaker 1: we got from you being so honest about your feminist journey.
3:13
Speaker 1: A lot of people identified with that journey. They said,
3:16
Speaker 1: I often felt like I couldn't call myself a feminist,
3:18
Speaker 1: or I would feel like I'm not feminist enough, or
3:20
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not this enough or not that enough.
3:22
Speaker 1: So it's certainly something that people um grapple with. I
3:26
Speaker 1: also thought it was really interesting that you talked about
3:28
Speaker 1: the ways that the earlier iterations of this show stuff
3:31
Speaker 1: I'm never told you really helped you own your feminism.
3:35
Speaker 1: That working behind the scenes as a producer on that
3:37
Speaker 1: show really helped you one kind of get a crash
3:42
Speaker 1: course and all these different issues and then to help
3:44
Speaker 1: you own Mike, hell, yeah, I'm a feminist, you know,
3:46
Speaker 1: from the girl who wanted to get her own textbook
3:50
Speaker 1: when she was in school. If you if you remember
3:52
Speaker 1: that story and he told it's a good one. Um
3:55
Speaker 1: to this badat feminist podcast co host, thank you. It
4:00
Speaker 1: was so instrumental and I'm not exaggerating when I say
4:04
Speaker 1: it changed the course of my life. It gave me
4:10
Speaker 1: so much perspective and I don't know where I would
4:13
Speaker 1: be probably still like too embarrassed to make cookies for anyone,
4:20
Speaker 1: but wanting to make cookies to people trampling with the cookies,
4:24
Speaker 1: the cookie issue, it's going to me. Well, Anny, you
4:27
Speaker 1: are actually not alone. So I was so inspired by
4:30
Speaker 1: that episode in Your Honesty that I put out a
4:32
Speaker 1: little bit of a call on social media and I said, hey, feminists,
4:35
Speaker 1: what was the thing that made you a feminist? And,
4:37
Speaker 1: as we know, for any part of that was sminty
4:40
Speaker 1: and you were not alone. Karina on Twitter agrees with you.
4:44
Speaker 1: She said that earlier iterations with stuff Mom never told
4:46
Speaker 1: you really helped shape her feminism. She wrote, I started
4:49
Speaker 1: listening as I turned twenty, back when Molly and Kristen
4:52
Speaker 1: or my dream team. They opened my eyes so many
4:54
Speaker 1: issues that impact women on a daily basis. I am
4:57
Speaker 1: a feminist because of all the women that have hosted
4:58
Speaker 1: the show, and they've thought me and inspired me to be,
5:01
Speaker 1: which I think is so nice. It's it's almost like
5:03
Speaker 1: a similar thing to what you went through. Yeah, it
5:07
Speaker 1: is very much similar. Um. Podcasting is such an interesting
5:11
Speaker 1: thing because it can be solitary sometimes because you're in
5:14
Speaker 1: room and we're talking together and it's lovely, but to
5:17
Speaker 1: hear from other people that are sharing this experience with
5:20
Speaker 1: you is so rewarding. And I connect to that so
5:23
Speaker 1: much because I was a listener to I was hearing
5:26
Speaker 1: it my ears and thinking like, wow, I've never considered
5:30
Speaker 1: all of this, this, this, this, this, and there are
5:33
Speaker 1: women that are thinking like me and it it gave
5:36
Speaker 1: me the strength that I needed two become allowed and
5:41
Speaker 1: proud feminist. Yeah, and the coast of the feminist pocket.
5:44
Speaker 1: I know another person on Twitter whom I loved their response.
5:51
Speaker 1: This is from at free Pants, one of my favorite
5:54
Speaker 1: Twitter users. Actually it's hilarious. Um. They said that Sailor
5:58
Speaker 1: Moon an all girl team saving the world. Yes, please,
6:01
Speaker 1: the Spice Girls, which I used to have love when
6:04
Speaker 1: I was growing up, Destiny's Child Zena and strangely enough, Catwoman,
6:09
Speaker 1: a victim turned a villain with her own agency. Is it?
6:12
Speaker 1: Can you relate to that? Yes? I may or may
6:14
Speaker 1: not dress up as Catwoman once a year. Oh my gosh, wait,
6:19
Speaker 1: board a holiday or just around the house. Yeah, it's
6:24
Speaker 1: just making an omelet and a catwoman. I can see
6:28
Speaker 1: someone someone coming to your place and me being like,
6:30
Speaker 1: I'm going to slip into something more comfortable and then
6:31
Speaker 1: you come back just to see their reaction. Yeah, I'm
6:39
Speaker 1: we're painting this very strange picture of my outside of
6:43
Speaker 1: work life and I don't. I'm not opposed to it. Yeah,
6:46
Speaker 1: people you should. People should get to know the real
6:48
Speaker 1: Annie as I do, because it's glorious. Thank you. Another
6:53
Speaker 1: Twitter users Spotlight and on Inclusion said at Annie to
6:57
Speaker 1: Franco Lyrics, she opened my ears to struggle as I
7:00
Speaker 1: hadn't get encountered, but it meant I was more prepared
7:03
Speaker 1: and knew what things shouldn't be tolerated. I learned that
7:06
Speaker 1: strong women call out bullsh but can still love tenderly
7:10
Speaker 1: and find meaning in small moments, which I I love
7:13
Speaker 1: that too, because one of my biggest pet peeves, especially
7:16
Speaker 1: in media, is the strong woman who that's all she is, Like,
7:20
Speaker 1: you get rid of all femininity and she's this one
7:24
Speaker 1: dimensional strong lady. But it's okay to be to love
7:30
Speaker 1: tenderly and be have these feminine things and still be
7:34
Speaker 1: a feminist and be strong. We can be multidimensional, complex people,
7:40
Speaker 1: I know, right, I definitely I love seeing that and
7:48
Speaker 1: hearing that, um, just women calling out bulls and being
7:53
Speaker 1: strong but also still women. Yeah. I relate to Spotlight
7:58
Speaker 1: on Inclusion so much on this because I probably no surprise.
8:01
Speaker 1: I loved any Diffranco growing up. Um. I thought she
8:04
Speaker 1: was so red and so cool, and you know, I
8:07
Speaker 1: had a short that said righteous Bitch was, which was
8:09
Speaker 1: the name of her recording label. But as this this
8:12
Speaker 1: Twitter user points out, her music was very strong and
8:17
Speaker 1: it was strong women calling out, but it was also
8:20
Speaker 1: very tender. Um, whenever I go through a tough romantic time,
8:24
Speaker 1: you can bet and listening to Untouchable Phase, which if
8:26
Speaker 1: you know that song, you know, it's like a perfect
8:28
Speaker 1: song to It's a very good breakup song. It's a
8:31
Speaker 1: very good you know, um yeah, just good note. If
8:35
Speaker 1: I hear that song, I'll be like, oh, there's a
8:38
Speaker 1: great line. I mean, this is this is really like
8:39
Speaker 1: if you really want to get to some emo bridget
8:42
Speaker 1: it's a great line on that song where she says, um,
8:45
Speaker 1: it's you and your untouchable face, you for existing in
8:48
Speaker 1: the first place, and who am I that I should
8:51
Speaker 1: be longing for your touch? Who am I? You can't
8:53
Speaker 1: even give me that much? Like, yes, you know, but
8:56
Speaker 1: it's also very sad, very tender. So yeah, I think
8:59
Speaker 1: this Twitter or use everything nails what it is about
9:02
Speaker 1: those lyrics where it's just like what you were saying,
9:04
Speaker 1: on the one hand, it's very strong and very independent,
9:08
Speaker 1: but on the other hand, it's very tender and touching
9:10
Speaker 1: and loving and pointing it. Um, it's the it's the
9:13
Speaker 1: beautiful mess that is the modern day feminist. I guess
9:18
Speaker 1: absolutely contained an a Diffranco lyrics exactly. We should do
9:21
Speaker 1: an episode on her. I would love it. I'm so
9:24
Speaker 1: impressed that you just busted that all right now, I could.
9:27
Speaker 1: I might. This is embarrassing. I might know every Annie
9:33
Speaker 1: DeFranco song by heart. And there was one night where
9:36
Speaker 1: I got very drunk in a bar with my Stephanie
9:37
Speaker 1: shout at the Stephanie Black Um where we were I
9:41
Speaker 1: want to I want to say it was a karaoke bar,
9:43
Speaker 1: but it wasn't. We were just drunk and screaming in
9:46
Speaker 1: the lyrics to Annie DeFranco. And I'm sure you thought
9:50
Speaker 1: you sounded amazing. Girl. Yeah, shout out to that bar
9:54
Speaker 1: that didn't kick us out but probably should have. Yeah,
9:57
Speaker 1: very very kind of you to let them live that moment.
10:00
Speaker 1: Sometimes your drunk feminist rage cannot be contained. Oh I
10:03
Speaker 1: know about that. So what I loved about these responses
10:15
Speaker 1: on Twitter was that it really makes you think you know,
10:18
Speaker 1: what was the thing that made me become a feminist? Like,
10:20
Speaker 1: what were some of the figures and celebrities and media
10:24
Speaker 1: and things that really helped me own that label? And
10:27
Speaker 1: in the episode that you did around your Your Journey
10:30
Speaker 1: to Feminism, I shared that one of the things for
10:32
Speaker 1: me was Bitch Magazine. And you know, I talked a
10:35
Speaker 1: bit about this on that episode if y'all have heard it.
10:37
Speaker 1: But you know, I grew up in the middle of nowhere,
10:39
Speaker 1: and I grew up in a really white small town,
10:42
Speaker 1: and I spent a lot of my young adult life
10:45
Speaker 1: feeling out of place and not really sure how or
10:49
Speaker 1: where I fit in with the world, and thinking, gee,
10:51
Speaker 1: if I maybe I'll never feel like I belong anywhere.
10:54
Speaker 1: Maybe this is just my life. I'll always feel like
10:56
Speaker 1: the odd ball. And you know, when I was in
10:59
Speaker 1: high school, I listened to music like Whole and I
11:02
Speaker 1: still love Whole and Latigue Ree and all these great
11:05
Speaker 1: sort of like riot girl musicians that I really loved.
11:09
Speaker 1: And I loved music. I was also drawn to movies
11:12
Speaker 1: and TV shows that sort of had a m had
11:15
Speaker 1: heroines or main characters who were sort of like troubled
11:18
Speaker 1: and wayward young women I'm talking about things like the craft.
11:23
Speaker 1: I can probably quote in its entirety box Fire, which
11:27
Speaker 1: is a movie based on a Joyce Carol Oates book
11:29
Speaker 1: about a group of sort of wayward girls who form
11:31
Speaker 1: a kind of a girl gang. Um, you know, things
11:34
Speaker 1: like buffy, things like girl Interrupted, anything involving like a dark, wayward,
11:40
Speaker 1: misunderstood female protagonist. I was like in and I don't
11:45
Speaker 1: think I quite realized it, but these were like the
11:47
Speaker 1: early budding kind of feminist seedlings inside of me. And
11:51
Speaker 1: it wasn't until encountering Bitch magazine that those seedlings kind
11:56
Speaker 1: of became a plan and it all crystallized. I was like, Oh,
11:58
Speaker 1: I'm a feminist. That's the word. That's why I like
12:01
Speaker 1: all these like weird dark movies and all these women
12:04
Speaker 1: screaming in my ears and my in my earphones. That's
12:06
Speaker 1: what this is like. It really was like a like
12:10
Speaker 1: the stars all aligned, and you know, growing up in
12:13
Speaker 1: a small town, I remember the series of events that
12:16
Speaker 1: led to this very clearly Burns and Noble, you know,
12:19
Speaker 1: and that was in a small This is gonna sound dumb,
12:21
Speaker 1: but when you're in a small town that was like
12:23
Speaker 1: the height of cosmopolitan life. Was it the same for you.
12:27
Speaker 1: I had to get I had to drive thirty minutes,
12:31
Speaker 1: and it was such a like we would hang out
12:34
Speaker 1: there just like look at that's like a very specific
12:40
Speaker 1: like when you live in the middle of nowhere, there's
12:41
Speaker 1: a very specific thing driving to the Burns and Noble
12:44
Speaker 1: in your town, even if it's like far away, to
12:47
Speaker 1: sit and drink coffee and just be around books. And
12:50
Speaker 1: for you that feels like, oh, I mean, I felt
12:52
Speaker 1: like I was like living in Manhattan, like hanging out
12:55
Speaker 1: in the village. Yes, like that was the height of
13:00
Speaker 1: cosmopolitan life right there. Like in Stay in Virginia when
13:05
Speaker 1: I was growing up. That's what they must be doing
13:08
Speaker 1: in Manhattan. Drinking a caramel machiata in a Starbucks in
13:13
Speaker 1: your school uniform four pm. That is what people in
13:16
Speaker 1: New York do. Yes, yes, and looking forward to perusing
13:20
Speaker 1: the aisles, every aisle of book That's what I would do.
13:23
Speaker 1: I would walk down every aisle and be like maybe
13:25
Speaker 1: I could read that, Yeah, maybe let myself pick out
13:28
Speaker 1: one book. Yeah, And it's it's it's wild because the
13:32
Speaker 1: experience of going to Barnes and Noble felt kind of
13:36
Speaker 1: new and exciting and different for me and it's signaled, oh,
13:40
Speaker 1: possibility outside of my release small town. And there was
13:42
Speaker 1: possibility outside of the things I saw around me because
13:45
Speaker 1: it was difficult to get access to other kinds of things.
13:47
Speaker 1: And I know people who are a bit younger, maybe
13:49
Speaker 1: you're like, ever heard of the internet? Listen, I am
13:53
Speaker 1: thirty two years old, my thirty two or three three?
13:56
Speaker 1: I don't want a birthday sidebar, how dis bridged. I'm
14:01
Speaker 1: in my thirties right. So when I was growing up, like,
14:02
Speaker 1: we didn't get a computer in our house until I
14:05
Speaker 1: was almost off to college. I didn't have my first
14:07
Speaker 1: personal computer that I owned until I was a sophomore
14:10
Speaker 1: in college. Like, I showed up to college without a computer.
14:12
Speaker 1: I don't think because we have computers, that was the thing.
14:16
Speaker 1: And so I think that younger folks forget what it
14:21
Speaker 1: was like to not really have easy access to things
14:26
Speaker 1: that showed you the world outside of your own backyard.
14:30
Speaker 1: And you know, when we when we got a computer
14:32
Speaker 1: in our kitchen, it was that dialogue and it wasn't
14:35
Speaker 1: the same as now or if you want feminist perspectives,
14:37
Speaker 1: you google it and there's a trillion things out there.
14:39
Speaker 1: It wasn't like that, And so even as someone who
14:41
Speaker 1: was interested in different kinds of music. Finding getting my
14:45
Speaker 1: hands on that music was a slog. It involved conning
14:48
Speaker 1: my dad, who luckily was a big jazz fan, having
14:51
Speaker 1: him drive me into the city of Richmond so we
14:54
Speaker 1: could go to this record store Planned nine Music, which
14:56
Speaker 1: is still there today, and I had to say there
14:58
Speaker 1: had to be something that he on it, So there
15:00
Speaker 1: had to be like it had to coincide with, oh,
15:02
Speaker 1: there's this new jazz record out that I want, and
15:05
Speaker 1: Bridget wants to go dig through the whatever music, you know,
15:09
Speaker 1: the whatever feminist band, whatever. And it involved like asking
15:13
Speaker 1: my dad to drive me on the odd chance, and
15:15
Speaker 1: it was like he wanted to go to going and
15:17
Speaker 1: then hoping they had whatever I wanted in stock and
15:20
Speaker 1: you know, if they didn't, it was like can you
15:22
Speaker 1: order it? And then that was another thing, so like
15:24
Speaker 1: in two weeks, I gotta figure out how I'm gonna
15:26
Speaker 1: get back there, and it was It wasn't mean. Part
15:30
Speaker 1: of it was kind of fun because it was like
15:31
Speaker 1: hunting things down and it was like a little bit
15:33
Speaker 1: of a treasure hunt. But you know, people take for
15:35
Speaker 1: granted what that was like, and these days you have
15:39
Speaker 1: everything at your fingertips, and back then it just wasn't
15:41
Speaker 1: the case. Yeah, Um, Bridget and I had a conversation
15:45
Speaker 1: off Mike about how I also had the one dial
15:48
Speaker 1: up computer and the connection was so slow that it
15:51
Speaker 1: would take time. I had a hotmail email and it
15:55
Speaker 1: would take probably fifteen minutes for it to load. And
15:58
Speaker 1: I was really big and too fan fiction, Um and
16:03
Speaker 1: I because we had to share the computer and everyone
16:05
Speaker 1: had thirty minute block, I would print out the fan
16:09
Speaker 1: fiction so I could take it to my room. I'd
16:11
Speaker 1: staple it together if I would take it to my
16:15
Speaker 1: room and read it. And sometimes the fan fiction was crappy,
16:18
Speaker 1: and I was really disappointed by because I didn't have
16:20
Speaker 1: time to read it because you spent all this time,
16:22
Speaker 1: all your a lotted hour computer time printing this stuff out. Yes,
16:27
Speaker 1: And then I'm like, well, this is what a waste.
16:30
Speaker 1: I gotta wait till tomorrow in my thirty minutes, and
16:33
Speaker 1: I hope I find a better one. Yeah. God, what
16:36
Speaker 1: those were the days? Right? What a strange experience to
16:39
Speaker 1: explain to people now, I mean it's explained that to
16:41
Speaker 1: someone who grew up always having a smartphone, right, they
16:45
Speaker 1: would be like, what are you? They wouldn't what are
16:47
Speaker 1: you talking about? Dial up? What too? What were your name?
16:52
Speaker 1: And then my mom would get on the phone. Oh
16:54
Speaker 1: my god. Remember when your mom would pick up the phone.
16:57
Speaker 1: You'd be like, I'm on the internet. Hang on the phone.
17:00
Speaker 1: Oh oh my god. Nothing, nothing would ruin your day faster.
17:05
Speaker 1: And my mom was always like, what are you doing
17:07
Speaker 1: up there? And here stops coming like oh no. It's
17:11
Speaker 1: always like, oh man, there needs to be a podcast
17:14
Speaker 1: on like the very early days of the internet. Because
17:18
Speaker 1: I'm sure there is, but that was it was such
17:20
Speaker 1: a specific and unique experience. It really was. It really was.
17:24
Speaker 1: And I another thing to people don't think about his
17:28
Speaker 1: maps and like making plans, and I remember I used
17:31
Speaker 1: to print out these maps and I would draw on
17:33
Speaker 1: them like here, now you just put in your GPS. Anyway,
17:39
Speaker 1: we are getting away from this podcast. It's just like
17:42
Speaker 1: you darn kids. But my my dad still has those
17:46
Speaker 1: remember those giant road atlases that were huge. He still
17:49
Speaker 1: has those in his car. But there must be a
17:53
Speaker 1: dad thing where yeah, not throwing out these good atlas
17:55
Speaker 1: is yeah, you never know when you're gonna need an atlas. Okay,
18:00
Speaker 1: you're you're right. I can't I can't argue with that, Okay,
18:03
Speaker 1: So to bring it back, because this isn't just a
18:04
Speaker 1: podcast about you, darn kids, darn between. Basically, Bitch magazine
18:12
Speaker 1: was foundational to me becoming a feminist and owning a
18:15
Speaker 1: owning feminism, understanding feminism. I remember very very clearly the
18:19
Speaker 1: first time that I saw it in Barnes and Noble,
18:21
Speaker 1: and I thought, Bitch, what is that? You know, I
18:24
Speaker 1: had never seen a magazine that was so in your face,
18:28
Speaker 1: so unapologetic. You know, there have been other magazines that
18:32
Speaker 1: were sort of feminist e that I knew about that
18:35
Speaker 1: Burnes and Noble did not carry for whatever reason. I'm
18:37
Speaker 1: talking about magazines like Bust and Jane and Sassy. But
18:41
Speaker 1: Bitch was different for me because I felt like that
18:43
Speaker 1: kind of magazine that you were, you weren't being sold
18:46
Speaker 1: something all the time. It was very sort of skeptical
18:48
Speaker 1: and critical, which I which I identified with. And yeah,
18:52
Speaker 1: I remember my mom wouldn't actually let me have it
18:54
Speaker 1: in the house because it had a dirty word on
18:56
Speaker 1: the cover, so I'd have to rip off the cover
18:58
Speaker 1: so she wouldn't see. Um, you can see what I had.
19:02
Speaker 1: And yeah, honestly, like reading, I mean had interviews with
19:05
Speaker 1: like Bell Hooks and things like that, things that I
19:08
Speaker 1: would have never ever been had access to. And honestly,
19:13
Speaker 1: when you're young and you feel marginalized and isolated and
19:17
Speaker 1: you don't feel like you have a lot of people
19:19
Speaker 1: who understand you, and I guess a lot of teams
19:22
Speaker 1: feel that way, whether you're a feminist or a woman
19:24
Speaker 1: or whatever. I think that's part of being a young
19:26
Speaker 1: person when you find something that you feel like speaks
19:30
Speaker 1: to you and that you feel like provides a glimpse
19:32
Speaker 1: of what the world could be like outside of your
19:34
Speaker 1: small town or whatever, um, and that there are people
19:37
Speaker 1: out there that think like you, feel like you had
19:39
Speaker 1: the same ideas as you. That's huge for me. That
19:41
Speaker 1: was like I was like a pair of wings. Oh
19:43
Speaker 1: my god. And you know, when I was in school,
19:45
Speaker 1: I meant to a small, prestigious Catholic girls high school
19:48
Speaker 1: in Richmond, Virginia, and my school was great. My school
19:50
Speaker 1: was full of really amazing and talented, strong women. Um.
19:54
Speaker 1: They had a real tradition of social justice and social change.
19:59
Speaker 1: And to desend that these nuns displayed at my school,
20:02
Speaker 1: which I loved and I was very I cherished even
20:05
Speaker 1: to this day, but they weren't talking about what to
20:08
Speaker 1: do when your boyfriend rapes you, or you know, how
20:15
Speaker 1: to be a feminist if you feel isolated from feminism
20:17
Speaker 1: because you're not a white woman. People in my school
20:20
Speaker 1: were talking about in the importance of being a strong woman,
20:23
Speaker 1: which was great, but they weren't talking about it in
20:26
Speaker 1: terms of like issues that I can understand. And this
20:29
Speaker 1: was the first time that that was I was sort
20:31
Speaker 1: of exposed to that, and so it was huge. It
20:33
Speaker 1: was huge for me. It's amazing how much just knowing
20:38
Speaker 1: that there are other people out there that you're not
20:40
Speaker 1: the only one, how beneficial that is, and how much
20:44
Speaker 1: that can gird you and provide support for you to
20:51
Speaker 1: continue to flourish in your path, and to know that
20:55
Speaker 1: there's there's something outside of this, there's something waiting for
20:59
Speaker 1: me that I can I can latch onto, that I
21:01
Speaker 1: can do later. Definitely, definitely. Well that's why I am
21:06
Speaker 1: so so so excited and kind of fan girling that
21:10
Speaker 1: we're about to be joined by none other and Bitch
21:13
Speaker 1: Magazine co founder Andy Zeisler after this quick break and
21:28
Speaker 1: we're back. I am so so, so so so excited
21:32
Speaker 1: to be joined by Andy Zeisler. Andy is a long
21:36
Speaker 1: time freelance writer and illustrator, and she co founded Bitch Media.
21:39
Speaker 1: In these days, Bitches circulated internationally to more than fifty people.
21:45
Speaker 1: Andy's work has appeared in numerous major publications like MS, Mother, Jones, Bust,
21:49
Speaker 1: and the San Francisco Chronicle. Today, we are so excited
21:53
Speaker 1: to be welcomed in studio with the one the only
21:56
Speaker 1: Bitch co founder Andy Zeisler. Andy, thank you so much
21:59
Speaker 1: for being here today. Thanks for having me so Andy.
22:04
Speaker 1: I opened this podcast talking about how foundational Bitch Magazine
22:09
Speaker 1: was to you know, high school Bridget and her understanding
22:13
Speaker 1: of feminism. It's one of the reasons why I host
22:15
Speaker 1: a I co host a feminist podcast is because a
22:18
Speaker 1: bit it was really the thing that opened my eyes
22:20
Speaker 1: and um, it's interesting and doing research for this episode,
22:24
Speaker 1: this great documentary filmmaker um Amy Zerig, she was an
22:28
Speaker 1: early subscriber to bit She recalls that when um Bitch
22:31
Speaker 1: first got started there it was the kind of thing
22:34
Speaker 1: that you dreamed should exist but didn't exist. And I
22:37
Speaker 1: think that's very, very true. So I think when I
22:40
Speaker 1: when I talked to you, I think, gee, Andy is
22:42
Speaker 1: the kind of person who thinks O x y Z
22:45
Speaker 1: should exist and then makes it right. Like that seems
22:48
Speaker 1: to be kind of who you are. So I just
22:50
Speaker 1: wanted to start by by asking, like what made you
22:53
Speaker 1: a feminist, Like what what was your upbringing? Like how
22:55
Speaker 1: did you become the kind of person that you know
22:58
Speaker 1: sees this this need and and creates it. Well, first
23:03
Speaker 1: of all, I just want to say, you know, thank
23:04
Speaker 1: you so much for for your kind words, because that
23:08
Speaker 1: like hearing that that that's really affected people and change
23:12
Speaker 1: their thinking and inspired them is like that's literally why
23:15
Speaker 1: we do this, Like nobody is in this for you know,
23:18
Speaker 1: the money, you know, like feminist independent media really is
23:23
Speaker 1: like it's it's just all about trying to to make
23:27
Speaker 1: a difference. And you know, seeing that, you know, even
23:31
Speaker 1: a few people out in the world, um being inspired
23:34
Speaker 1: by it can can really lead to a lot of
23:37
Speaker 1: cool stuff happening. So so yeah, thanks for that. It's
23:41
Speaker 1: funny like I don't remember, you know, I think they're
23:45
Speaker 1: like individual moments in my upbringing where I, you know,
23:51
Speaker 1: I sort of clocked that something was unfair or like
23:55
Speaker 1: I recognized an instance of h sexism or just kind
24:00
Speaker 1: of like ambient discrimination, but I didn't have any language
24:04
Speaker 1: for it. You know, it wasn't. It wasn't like my
24:07
Speaker 1: parents were particularly political. Well, first of all, I read
24:12
Speaker 1: a ton of books, and so I think the first
24:15
Speaker 1: time I saw the word feminist or learned about the
24:20
Speaker 1: concept of feminism wasn't in school. It was probably in uh,
24:27
Speaker 1: like a young adult novel by Norma Klein, who was
24:31
Speaker 1: this New York writer who wrote these incredibly uh you know,
24:37
Speaker 1: medi intellectual novels about like, you know, earnest white liberal
24:44
Speaker 1: kids in New York City sort of discovering their sexuality
24:48
Speaker 1: or whatnot. And so there were often like feminist characters
24:51
Speaker 1: that she would write about, and it wasn't it just
24:55
Speaker 1: wasn't a big deal. It was like, oh, yeah, this
24:56
Speaker 1: person is a feminist and this is what she believes. Um.
25:00
Speaker 1: And so I think that was where I first heard
25:04
Speaker 1: the like, heard of the concept and recognized it um.
25:08
Speaker 1: And then you know, at some point I just must
25:11
Speaker 1: have put it together with stuff that I, like, I said,
25:16
Speaker 1: stuff that I sort of recognized as being a feeling
25:20
Speaker 1: off to me, like the fact, for instance, that like, uh,
25:25
Speaker 1: my brother, one of my one of my older brothers,
25:28
Speaker 1: took homac in junior high. So he knew how to
25:32
Speaker 1: use a sewing machine, and yet my mother would constantly
25:35
Speaker 1: ask me to like mend his clothing, like can you
25:38
Speaker 1: have your brother's jeans? Or like can you sew this
25:41
Speaker 1: button on your brother's shirt? And it's not that I
25:44
Speaker 1: minded doing it. I just minded that I should be
25:47
Speaker 1: the one to do it, even though he actually had
25:51
Speaker 1: the skills to do it, you know. So it was
25:55
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff like that. Yeah, I can totally
25:58
Speaker 1: relate to that. Ridget and I've discussed before that we
26:01
Speaker 1: like cooking, we don't like being expected to be the
26:04
Speaker 1: one to cook. It's a very particular line of yeah,
26:09
Speaker 1: I don't mind doing this thing, but I don't want
26:12
Speaker 1: to be expected to be the one to do it either. Yeah.
26:16
Speaker 1: The chores in my house were just extremely gendered, and
26:20
Speaker 1: I was sort of like, this doesn't make sense, Like
26:23
Speaker 1: I like taking the garbage out. Why can't I take
26:25
Speaker 1: the garbage out? Like why do I have to clear
26:27
Speaker 1: the dinner table? Just yeah, yeah, that that was the
26:31
Speaker 1: case in my house too. To this day, I have
26:33
Speaker 1: never mowed a lawn in my life. It's never happened. More.
26:36
Speaker 1: I've never touched a low over because that's was like
26:39
Speaker 1: that that's a boy job. Quote unquote, you know, yeah,
26:43
Speaker 1: m can you talk a little bit about how a
26:45
Speaker 1: bit got started? So, um, my best friends from high
26:52
Speaker 1: school we went to we went to different colleges, but
26:54
Speaker 1: we stayed in touch, and when we graduated, uh, we
27:01
Speaker 1: just you know, we decided that we were going to
27:04
Speaker 1: spend the summer together. And she was planning to move
27:06
Speaker 1: to the Bay Area in San Francisco from New York,
27:11
Speaker 1: where we were from. And I didn't really know what
27:14
Speaker 1: I was doing. I just wasn't really sure. I was
27:17
Speaker 1: like maybe going to apply to grad school, but I
27:19
Speaker 1: also didn't really know. And um, so she was like,
27:24
Speaker 1: let's just, you know, let's just drive across country and
27:27
Speaker 1: you can see how you like California, and uh and
27:30
Speaker 1: I ended up, you know, really liking living there, and um,
27:34
Speaker 1: a lot of what we did, uh we you know,
27:38
Speaker 1: we had like pretty um normal grunt work sort of
27:43
Speaker 1: day jobs. She worked in a bookstore. I worked in
27:45
Speaker 1: an arts supply store, and during all our free time,
27:48
Speaker 1: we consume pop culture. We went to the movies, We
27:52
Speaker 1: bought magazines and sort of read them and shared them.
27:55
Speaker 1: We were constantly reading books. I was super into music
27:59
Speaker 1: and ended up becoming like a music journalist, and we
28:04
Speaker 1: just realized at some point how much time we were
28:07
Speaker 1: spending talking amongst ourselves about how media and pop culture
28:14
Speaker 1: really didn't seem to be evolving to reflect the kind
28:21
Speaker 1: of real world that we saw around us, both of
28:24
Speaker 1: us at separate times when we were living in New York.
28:28
Speaker 1: For me, it was right after high school, were interns
28:32
Speaker 1: at Sassy Magazine, which was um a teen magazine that
28:41
Speaker 1: was started specifically to kind of counter the status quo
28:47
Speaker 1: of teen magazines where you know, they were filled with
28:50
Speaker 1: diet tips and they sort of centered you know, boys
28:53
Speaker 1: and prom as the you know, going concerns of a
28:59
Speaker 1: teenage girl's life, and Sassy, which was based off of
29:03
Speaker 1: a Australian magazine called Dolly, really went in a different direction.
29:08
Speaker 1: It was very much about like, well, you know, why
29:11
Speaker 1: should boys be the center of your life? Were like,
29:14
Speaker 1: it's great to be an individual, um, and so interning
29:20
Speaker 1: there was a really interesting, uh, sort of lesson in
29:26
Speaker 1: how the mainstream media sausage gets made. And at the
29:31
Speaker 1: time that Lisa and I were, you know, sort of
29:38
Speaker 1: doing all this talking about pop culture and talking about
29:41
Speaker 1: how it didn't really reflect our lives are the lives
29:44
Speaker 1: of the people we knew Sassy magazine. It didn't fold,
29:49
Speaker 1: but it got bought by a very large media conglomerate
29:55
Speaker 1: and it kind of got zombified, Like we called it
29:58
Speaker 1: bizarro Sassy because they had they fired all the really
30:02
Speaker 1: interesting writers and editors and they brought in a new
30:06
Speaker 1: crop and they tried to sort of mimic the tone
30:10
Speaker 1: and the attitude of the original Sassie, but it was
30:13
Speaker 1: like it was just so embarrassing. It which is it
30:16
Speaker 1: just like didn't work. You can always tell when when
30:19
Speaker 1: it's like people are faking the funk. You know, it's
30:22
Speaker 1: to be authentic, and this is super non authentic and
30:25
Speaker 1: in fact it's embarrassing. Yeah, it's sort of like the
30:29
Speaker 1: scene in Mean Girls where Amy Poehler's like, I'm not
30:32
Speaker 1: a regular mom, I'm a coal mom, and the new
30:35
Speaker 1: Sassie was absolutely like it was. It was, Yeah, it
30:39
Speaker 1: was embarrassing. It was mortifying. And and so we started
30:43
Speaker 1: talking about like the idea that you know, in in
30:47
Speaker 1: kind of mourning the demise of Sassy, we were sort
30:51
Speaker 1: of like, there needs to be something to fill that gap.
30:56
Speaker 1: There needs to be something that you know, has a
30:59
Speaker 1: feminist spirit but also meets teenagers where they're at. UM
31:05
Speaker 1: and MS for a long time had been you know,
31:08
Speaker 1: the feminist magazine. And actually when I worked, when I
31:12
Speaker 1: was an Internet sassy, MS was a few floors up
31:15
Speaker 1: in the one Time Square building and so I was
31:18
Speaker 1: always running up there to get like old copies for research. UM.
31:22
Speaker 1: But at the time this was around, uh MS was
31:28
Speaker 1: really no longer engaging with media and pop culture as
31:32
Speaker 1: sort of a locusts of feminism. It had really you know,
31:36
Speaker 1: turned towards incredibly meati global investigative reporting, which was great,
31:43
Speaker 1: but it really there was that lack and uh and
31:49
Speaker 1: Lisa and I were just, you know, we were kind
31:51
Speaker 1: of frustrated readers. We were looking to read the kind
31:57
Speaker 1: of stuff that we were talking about and that we
31:59
Speaker 1: wanted to write about, but there really wasn't much out there.
32:02
Speaker 1: I mean, there was, you know, there was very academic
32:05
Speaker 1: writing about media and pop culture, like you know, Bell
32:07
Speaker 1: Hooks and and folks like that, and then there was
32:10
Speaker 1: like maybe the occasional article in like Rolling Stone or
32:15
Speaker 1: Spin that might engage with you know, feminism or sexism
32:19
Speaker 1: in the music industry, but there was nothing obviously like
32:22
Speaker 1: there is now because this was just at the start
32:25
Speaker 1: of the Internet. Um. And so yeah, at some point
32:29
Speaker 1: we realized like, well, the stuff we want to read,
32:33
Speaker 1: we might have to be the ones to write it. Um.
32:36
Speaker 1: And so it really was in our minds like, this
32:40
Speaker 1: is stuff that we want to read, and we also
32:42
Speaker 1: see this as like a whole in in the market,
32:47
Speaker 1: you know, or or in the possibilities of you know,
32:51
Speaker 1: reading material and sort of inspiration for for teenagers and um.
32:57
Speaker 1: And so that was how we started conceiving of Bitch,
33:00
Speaker 1: was like, what if there was something that was a
33:03
Speaker 1: cross between Sassy and Miss that really acknowledged how central
33:09
Speaker 1: media and pop culture are two young people who are
33:13
Speaker 1: sort of forming their impressions about the world and about
33:16
Speaker 1: politics and about their place. Um. And that was, you know,
33:21
Speaker 1: that was how it started. That's perfect. I mean, you
33:26
Speaker 1: you really teased out my experience as a teenage reader
33:29
Speaker 1: of Bitch. You know my Um I shared earlier on
33:32
Speaker 1: the show that my mom wasn't the biggest fan of
33:35
Speaker 1: Bitch magazine had a dirty word on the cover, and
33:38
Speaker 1: she would buy me Miss magazine instead. And just like
33:41
Speaker 1: you said, I mean, Miss magazine was dealing with very
33:44
Speaker 1: important global issues that I'm glad they were dealing with.
33:47
Speaker 1: But you know, I was four keeen, I wasn't. I wasn't.
33:50
Speaker 1: That wasn't what I was trying to read, and I
33:53
Speaker 1: felt when I was just sort of grappling with what
33:56
Speaker 1: it was to be a feminist. Bitch spoke to me
33:58
Speaker 1: in a way that said, like, hey, you're maybe you're
34:01
Speaker 1: watching Buffy a lot, maybe you're doing this a lot,
34:03
Speaker 1: maybe you're doing that a lot. Well, you can take
34:05
Speaker 1: a feminist critique of those things. You know, maybe you
34:08
Speaker 1: love watching this thing or dealing with this piece of
34:11
Speaker 1: pop culture. That can be understanding how that works can
34:14
Speaker 1: be a part of your feminism and an expression of
34:16
Speaker 1: your feminist And that was the first time that I
34:18
Speaker 1: had ever encountered that, and it really just met me
34:22
Speaker 1: where I was, because you know what, when I was fourteen,
34:24
Speaker 1: I wish I was, but I wasn't the kind of
34:26
Speaker 1: fourteen year old who was interested in researching global poverty
34:29
Speaker 1: and it's impact on women, you know, in the world.
34:32
Speaker 1: I wish I was, but I was not. I was
34:34
Speaker 1: watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer and was wanting someone to
34:37
Speaker 1: give me a feminist critique of that. Through that lens
34:40
Speaker 1: and Bitch was the magazine that helped me deal with
34:43
Speaker 1: that and help me understand that. So what you're saying
34:46
Speaker 1: is I mean I was like, yeah, exactly that, That's
34:48
Speaker 1: exactly how it felt, right, And that was kind of
34:50
Speaker 1: our hunch was like, well, we can't be the only
34:53
Speaker 1: people out you know, we are obviously not the only
34:55
Speaker 1: people out there that you know, has these thoughts and
34:59
Speaker 1: lots to talk about them. And so we really we
35:02
Speaker 1: were just like, well we have to, you know, we
35:04
Speaker 1: have to chase this hunch that there is an audience
35:07
Speaker 1: for this um and that other people, you know, see
35:12
Speaker 1: popular culture and media as a way to uh kind
35:17
Speaker 1: of talk about you know, gender and feminism and power
35:21
Speaker 1: and sex um And yeah, so that's that's kind of
35:27
Speaker 1: what we That's kind of what we were hoping. How
35:30
Speaker 1: did you all become from interns at Sassy to financing
35:35
Speaker 1: your own media publication, Like that's that's the thing. I'm like,
35:38
Speaker 1: how did that happen? Well? We started incredibly small. We
35:43
Speaker 1: started as a zine. We were like, you know, black
35:47
Speaker 1: and white zine. And this was a time when zines
35:51
Speaker 1: were kind of having a moment um and I had
35:54
Speaker 1: been like an avid reader of zines starting when I
36:01
Speaker 1: was you know, early early on in college, UM, partly
36:06
Speaker 1: because of probably because of Fassy, which had like a
36:08
Speaker 1: little zine of the month feature, and you know, there
36:11
Speaker 1: was a big uh there was a publication called fact
36:14
Speaker 1: Sheet five that just listed all of the zines in
36:17
Speaker 1: the world that we're being produced by category. And so
36:21
Speaker 1: you know, you'd put two dollars in the mail and
36:25
Speaker 1: you know, at least eight five percent of the time
36:28
Speaker 1: you'd get a zine back. UM. And so I was
36:31
Speaker 1: really it wasn't perfect. You know, I would have like
36:37
Speaker 1: glitter in the envelope, you know what I mean. Like
36:39
Speaker 1: there was this very like communal sense of like we're all,
36:43
Speaker 1: you know, let's put on a show. We're all doing
36:45
Speaker 1: this um. And so we knew that, you know, we
36:51
Speaker 1: weren't going to come out you know blazing with like
36:54
Speaker 1: a business plan and like a full color thing. We
36:59
Speaker 1: want to to kind of see you know, kind of
37:03
Speaker 1: dip our toes in the independent media market. And we
37:09
Speaker 1: knew from the start that whatever we were going to
37:13
Speaker 1: do with this publication, UH, was not going to be
37:19
Speaker 1: appealing to like a large or mainstream market. You know,
37:24
Speaker 1: we knew that the kind of content we were hoping
37:28
Speaker 1: to publish was going to be very critical of mainstream media,
37:33
Speaker 1: of advertising, of uh kind of you know, the kind
37:38
Speaker 1: of gender mythology that's pushed by women's magazines and men's magazines,
37:44
Speaker 1: and so for us, it wasn't really a question. It
37:47
Speaker 1: was like, okay, so we're going to do this with
37:49
Speaker 1: the resources we have, which are not much. Um. There
37:54
Speaker 1: was a great museum in San Francisco, the Cartoon Art Museum,
37:57
Speaker 1: and they would have like public panels on things like,
38:02
Speaker 1: you know, drawing comics, are making zines, and we went
38:06
Speaker 1: to we went to one of the ones that was
38:08
Speaker 1: on you know, how to how to create and distribute
38:11
Speaker 1: your own zine, And that was sort of the moment
38:13
Speaker 1: where we were like, holy wow, we could actually do this. Um.
38:19
Speaker 1: And so we did, and we had definitely like our
38:23
Speaker 1: parents kicked in and Lisa's grandfather kicked in some money.
38:28
Speaker 1: But we're not talking like big bucks here. I think
38:31
Speaker 1: the entire first print run maybe cost three hundred dollars.
38:37
Speaker 1: And you know, we we were we thought we were
38:40
Speaker 1: it was just going to be Xerox, but the the place,
38:43
Speaker 1: the Xerox place we took it actually messed up and
38:46
Speaker 1: ended up offset printing it, so the first issue actually
38:48
Speaker 1: looked really good. Um. And then what we did is
38:52
Speaker 1: we just you know, put boxes of it in Lisa's
38:56
Speaker 1: you know, old station wagon and just drove around and
39:00
Speaker 1: went to every independent bookstore in Berkeley and Oakland and
39:04
Speaker 1: San Francisco. And at that time, because zines were sort
39:09
Speaker 1: of having this moment, you could walk in and say like, oh,
39:12
Speaker 1: I have this zine, do you want to sell it
39:14
Speaker 1: on consignment? The Bay Area at that time was really
39:18
Speaker 1: just you know, brimming with independent d I Y media.
39:24
Speaker 1: So we were definitely in the right place at the
39:26
Speaker 1: right time. I think if we had been in New York, um,
39:31
Speaker 1: we wouldn't have had that kind of uh, there wouldn't
39:35
Speaker 1: have been that sort of instant community and recognition that
39:38
Speaker 1: this is like part of something bigger. We started taking
39:44
Speaker 1: subscriptions immediately and had like a charter subscriber price, and
39:50
Speaker 1: people started subscribing, and uh, it was it was kind
39:54
Speaker 1: of wild and and and you know, and so we
39:57
Speaker 1: knew like, okay, so this is something we should we
39:59
Speaker 1: should definitely keep doing. We should try to make this
40:01
Speaker 1: as you know, kind of formal a process as we can,
40:05
Speaker 1: and try to have a public publishing schedule and and
40:09
Speaker 1: give ourselves deadlines and find you know, writers and things
40:13
Speaker 1: like that. So yeah, it uh, you know, we we
40:18
Speaker 1: definitely flew by the seat of our pants. And I
40:22
Speaker 1: often think that, you know, it's probably good that we
40:25
Speaker 1: knew kind of very little about magazine distribution and production,
40:32
Speaker 1: because it might have scared us off if we had
40:34
Speaker 1: known too much. Let's take a quick break and we're back,
40:45
Speaker 1: going back to the name and the trouble it got bridgeted.
40:53
Speaker 1: I feel like you're ir responsible for getting me grounded.
40:56
Speaker 1: If you die, I'm very sorry. Why did you call
41:05
Speaker 1: it bitch? You know, it's easy for me to say
41:08
Speaker 1: because she's not here, but um, my co editor, Lisa
41:14
Speaker 1: was very much, uh the kind like it was very
41:20
Speaker 1: much her project in the beginning, like she had like,
41:25
Speaker 1: you know, she was the stronger personality, and um, she
41:29
Speaker 1: was much more decisive than I was. And so when
41:32
Speaker 1: we started talking about names, you know, we didn't we
41:37
Speaker 1: did not like have that many options on the table.
41:39
Speaker 1: When she was like, I think we should call it
41:41
Speaker 1: bitch because it's a now and it's a verb, and
41:44
Speaker 1: I was like, well, that's cool, that's enough for me. Um,
41:47
Speaker 1: And of course we did talk about it. We talked
41:50
Speaker 1: about the fact that, like, well, the kind of stuff
41:53
Speaker 1: that we want to write about and that we want
41:56
Speaker 1: to publish is absolutely the kind of content that is
42:01
Speaker 1: going to be is going to get us tagged with
42:05
Speaker 1: that label. Um. In there wasn't the word bitch didn't
42:13
Speaker 1: have the kind of um sort of multifarious uses that
42:18
Speaker 1: it has now. It very much still was uh the
42:24
Speaker 1: word that you used to describe a woman who was,
42:28
Speaker 1: you know, saying something you didn't like, or doing something
42:30
Speaker 1: in a way you didn't like, or you know, standing
42:33
Speaker 1: up to other people. It didn't have the kind of
42:38
Speaker 1: friendly or like casual connotations or usage that it does now.
42:43
Speaker 1: You weren't hearing it on TV or on the radio.
42:49
Speaker 1: Um it very much still was one of those like
42:53
Speaker 1: seven dirty words that you couldn't say. And we thought
42:56
Speaker 1: about the idea of, you know what if we could
43:01
Speaker 1: reclaim this word for women who were strong and who
43:05
Speaker 1: stood up for themselves and who really wanted to to
43:09
Speaker 1: talk about the ways that gender functions and that sexism
43:15
Speaker 1: functions in media and pop culture. So the reason we
43:19
Speaker 1: had the you know, sort of tagline a feminist response
43:23
Speaker 1: to pop culture is that we really did want to
43:26
Speaker 1: have the word feminist in there somewhere, but we also
43:29
Speaker 1: kind of wanted a subtitle that was a little bit explanatory, um,
43:35
Speaker 1: because we knew that the word bitch would probably draw
43:38
Speaker 1: people in if they saw it on a newsstand, but
43:42
Speaker 1: we wanted them to also see very clearly that this
43:47
Speaker 1: was a feminist project. I love that. So you've mentioned
43:52
Speaker 1: a little bit about how the name bitch, how it
43:55
Speaker 1: sort of had a different connotation back when y'all first
43:58
Speaker 1: got started, sort along those lines. What was the feminist
44:02
Speaker 1: media landscape like when when when you were putting which together?
44:06
Speaker 1: I mean today there seems like if there's so many
44:09
Speaker 1: feminist publications and sort of feminist ish publications, you know
44:14
Speaker 1: where it's kind of feminist e but who knows, Um,
44:17
Speaker 1: what's what was the landscape like and sort of what
44:19
Speaker 1: how is it different than our our current feminist media landscape? Yeah, um,
44:24
Speaker 1: I mean it was very different. But you know, so
44:27
Speaker 1: we started Bitch in and in the early nineties, um, again,
44:33
Speaker 1: when we were both uh interning and very interested in Sassy,
44:39
Speaker 1: we were aware that there was a sort of there
44:43
Speaker 1: was sort of a feminism that was coalescing and a
44:49
Speaker 1: lot of it was really centered in media and pop culture.
44:54
Speaker 1: So like the riot girl movement, for instance, which started
44:58
Speaker 1: getting a lot of notice in the early nineties around
45:03
Speaker 1: um that was something that was, you know, very explicitly
45:07
Speaker 1: based in popular culture. It was a response to, uh,
45:12
Speaker 1: you know, sexism in the punk music scene. It was
45:15
Speaker 1: a response to, uh, you know, a kind of general
45:21
Speaker 1: sense that even these supposed alternative subcultures that were supposed
45:27
Speaker 1: to set themselves apart from mainstream culture, we're still replicating
45:32
Speaker 1: a lot of the gender and power dynamics of the
45:35
Speaker 1: things that they were supposedly against. And so riot girls
45:38
Speaker 1: zanes and riot girl art projects and newsletters were very
45:45
Speaker 1: much a new way to talk about feminism. And at
45:49
Speaker 1: the same time, in the wake of d Anita Hill
45:52
Speaker 1: and Clarence Thomas hearings, the third wave of feminism was
45:58
Speaker 1: was starting to be come a thing, and Rebecca Walker,
46:03
Speaker 1: Alice Alice Walker's daughter, had had coined that phrase third wave,
46:08
Speaker 1: and so there was some there was this sense of
46:11
Speaker 1: like a little bit of a you know, kind of
46:15
Speaker 1: ground swell of feminist thought and activity. There is something
46:22
Speaker 1: out there. MS is no longer you know, the only
46:26
Speaker 1: game in town. As far as feminist media. We could
46:30
Speaker 1: we could show up and and feel that we had
46:32
Speaker 1: sort of comrades in this space. Yeah. So, I mean,
46:37
Speaker 1: I I completely agree, having sort of existed while all
46:40
Speaker 1: of these things were bubbling up. Um. And a couple
46:42
Speaker 1: of things that set Bitch apart from magazines, like magazines
46:46
Speaker 1: that I enjoyed, like Bust and Sassy and Miss One
46:50
Speaker 1: was that, you know, you didn't really feel like you
46:52
Speaker 1: were being sold to a lot when you read Bus.
46:55
Speaker 1: There were ads and a lot of magazines if you
46:58
Speaker 1: feel like you're reading a magazine full of ads with
47:01
Speaker 1: a few articles. Bitch was not like that at all,
47:03
Speaker 1: Like it was very much about the content of the magazine.
47:06
Speaker 1: And there were ads, but like not that many and
47:09
Speaker 1: oftentimes very small, and you just didn't feel like you
47:11
Speaker 1: were being sold and marketed to. And as a as
47:14
Speaker 1: a teenage girl, that's all you see, right, Like you're
47:17
Speaker 1: getting bombarded all the time by this lip gloss, by
47:20
Speaker 1: this by that you're too fat, by these pills, Like
47:23
Speaker 1: it's hard, it's almost like inescapable. And so when I
47:26
Speaker 1: would be Bitch, it's like, oh, it's a little bit
47:28
Speaker 1: of a escape from that. And I don't, I know,
47:30
Speaker 1: that's something that you've written about Andy in your book
47:33
Speaker 1: we were feminists once you read a lot about how
47:36
Speaker 1: these days, you know, feminism is cool, it's marketable, like
47:39
Speaker 1: it's it's on trend and on brand to to brand
47:43
Speaker 1: yourself as as feminists to just sell more, and you know,
47:48
Speaker 1: in in a kind of way like no shame to that,
47:50
Speaker 1: like if you actually have feminist principles and your marketing
47:53
Speaker 1: things alongside those values. Sure, okay, but you know, I
47:59
Speaker 1: feel like Bitch was so skeptical of consumerist culture. Was
48:03
Speaker 1: that Was that a conscious choice, like an editorial choice
48:06
Speaker 1: that y'all made from the beginning? Definitely? I mean, um,
48:12
Speaker 1: like I said earlier, we knew that you know, this
48:14
Speaker 1: was not this was we were not creating something that
48:17
Speaker 1: like advertisers were going to be clamoring to, you know,
48:20
Speaker 1: put their put their ads in. Um. And when when
48:26
Speaker 1: I was at Sassy, certainly, you know, one of the
48:29
Speaker 1: things I one of the things I realized that I
48:32
Speaker 1: really hadn't thought about before was that you know, in
48:37
Speaker 1: in mainstream magazines, content is really just a vehicle for ads.
48:43
Speaker 1: It's not the other way around. Like you sell ads,
48:47
Speaker 1: you often have to create content that's adjacent to those ads,
48:51
Speaker 1: or you have to promise that you know, the you know,
48:54
Speaker 1: the big ad for like Stuart Whitesman shoes is going
48:58
Speaker 1: to run alongside a fashion spread that features Stuart Whitesman's shoes.
49:03
Speaker 1: In realizing that magazines are or mainstream magazines are essentially
49:09
Speaker 1: a way to sell eyes two advertisers, that was a
49:14
Speaker 1: real sort of see change in my understanding of magazines,
49:18
Speaker 1: which was a medium I had always just absolutely loved
49:22
Speaker 1: with bits, you know, because we knew that it wasn't
49:26
Speaker 1: it didn't really have the kind of uh draw for advertisers,
49:30
Speaker 1: and because we knew that we were going to be
49:33
Speaker 1: critiquing ads and the way that that ads are used,
49:38
Speaker 1: in the way that they are, the way that they
49:40
Speaker 1: sort of work on particularly female psyches, it just didn't
49:45
Speaker 1: really occur to us. And that that's why we you know,
49:49
Speaker 1: sort of very quickly realized like, oh, well we could
49:53
Speaker 1: we could be a nonprofit, Like we could actually uh
49:58
Speaker 1: find a different way to to raise money than advertising.
50:02
Speaker 1: We could focus on, you know, getting sponsors or getting
50:07
Speaker 1: donors or and what we eventually did was becoming almost
50:12
Speaker 1: fully read or supported. We recognize very early on that
50:16
Speaker 1: we were not going to be an ad driven magazine,
50:19
Speaker 1: and that you know, we certainly did want to kind
50:24
Speaker 1: of forge partnerships with like minded organizations, whether they were
50:29
Speaker 1: other nonprofit organizations or they were you know, record companies
50:34
Speaker 1: that were independent, or publishers that were independent, or like, uh,
50:38
Speaker 1: university programs that you know, wanted to get the word
50:42
Speaker 1: out about, you know, for instance, uh, you know, their STEM,
50:46
Speaker 1: their STEM programs or something like that. You know, if
50:50
Speaker 1: we were going to have advertisers, we wanted never to
50:54
Speaker 1: be in a position, uh where an ad that we
50:58
Speaker 1: would critique if it were in a mainstream magazine was
51:02
Speaker 1: in Bitch. You know. We never wanted to have that possibility,
51:07
Speaker 1: so we tried to be very intentional about it, created
51:11
Speaker 1: a revenue model that was not dependent on ads. Speaking
51:17
Speaker 1: of ads, um, the postal Service censored an ad for
51:21
Speaker 1: dildos in the back cover, which is something I firstly
51:23
Speaker 1: find hilarious now because I I was home for Christmas.
51:27
Speaker 1: My mom had like a land and some of the
51:30
Speaker 1: like lands end maybe some magazine she got in the
51:33
Speaker 1: mail and she was flipping through it, and like, next
51:36
Speaker 1: to the lawnombers was an entire page dedicated to different
51:40
Speaker 1: dildos and we got such a big laugh out of it,
51:42
Speaker 1: just because it was so unexpected, like in Placing and
51:45
Speaker 1: just in that magazine at all. So can you tell
51:48
Speaker 1: us a little bit about about this. Oh God, yeah,
51:52
Speaker 1: the dildo fiat so like it was. It was so
52:00
Speaker 1: I don't even remember. I don't even remember what happened,
52:04
Speaker 1: Like I remember, I remember having a conversation where I
52:09
Speaker 1: was like, because I think I was in a lot
52:11
Speaker 1: of ways very conservative, um in terms of what we
52:17
Speaker 1: were doing, Like I have always been sort of a pessimist.
52:21
Speaker 1: So I'm pretty sure that I did not see that
52:24
Speaker 1: ad before it went to press, because I feel positive
52:30
Speaker 1: that I would have been like, uh, we shouldn't do this.
52:34
Speaker 1: It's like, we're going to get in trouble. But maybe
52:36
Speaker 1: I I don't know, maybe I was preoccupied. Maybe I
52:39
Speaker 1: did see like the picture of the giant purple dildo
52:41
Speaker 1: and I was like, cool, carry on, Um was it?
52:45
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was Babe Land or whether
52:49
Speaker 1: it was I don't remember what the company it was.
52:52
Speaker 1: But you know, one of the regular sort of advertisers
52:57
Speaker 1: we had were female own sex Toys wars Um, and
53:03
Speaker 1: there were there were like a growing number at that time. Um.
53:07
Speaker 1: And so this issue went to press and the back
53:09
Speaker 1: cover was, you know, a picture of sort of a
53:13
Speaker 1: woman's uh crotch and her hand holding a dildo next
53:18
Speaker 1: to it. And pretty much as soon as the files
53:25
Speaker 1: got to the printer, we realized that, like there was
53:28
Speaker 1: going to be a problem because the printer was like, uh,
53:32
Speaker 1: y'all want to rethink this silbo Yeah, and so um,
53:44
Speaker 1: it just it just absolutely sort of exploded. I mean
53:48
Speaker 1: we we heard from uh subscribers, we heard from parents
53:53
Speaker 1: of subscribers, we heard from educators, We heard from people
53:57
Speaker 1: who were like, God, you guys, now I can't read
54:00
Speaker 1: my issue of Bitch on the Subway, which you know,
54:02
Speaker 1: we took very seriously, but um, but it was it
54:06
Speaker 1: wasn't until the postal Service got involved that that we
54:10
Speaker 1: were like, oh no, this could actually really sink us.
54:14
Speaker 1: Because what happens when there's something that the postal service
54:17
Speaker 1: deems obscene on your magazine cover back cover? You have
54:22
Speaker 1: to pay to have the rest of the issues polly
54:26
Speaker 1: bagged um. And it's it can get really expensive when
54:29
Speaker 1: you're sending out, you know, thousands of copies to to
54:32
Speaker 1: pay to have each one polly bagged um. And it
54:37
Speaker 1: was you know, we were worried about losing our you know,
54:40
Speaker 1: bulk mail license, our media mail license. You know. It
54:44
Speaker 1: was a it was a really interesting time because we
54:50
Speaker 1: were really finding out sort of the limits of uh
54:54
Speaker 1: kind of progressivism and independent content. And you know, obviously
55:00
Speaker 1: the postal service that's a government organization. We should have
55:04
Speaker 1: expected that, but I was, I was. I ended up
55:07
Speaker 1: being really surprised by how many subscribers, uh, you know,
55:12
Speaker 1: who were on board before. We're like, you know, I
55:19
Speaker 1: I just don't want to have to explain to my
55:21
Speaker 1: child what this is, or like I just don't want
55:25
Speaker 1: my parents to you know, see this and associated with me.
55:31
Speaker 1: And I fully understand all of that, I absolutely do,
55:36
Speaker 1: but it was it was really interesting. I was like, yeah,
55:39
Speaker 1: you can call a magazine bitch, and you can have
55:41
Speaker 1: you know, very explicitly feminist content, but there is always
55:45
Speaker 1: going to be a line in the sand, it seems
55:48
Speaker 1: like for people, and for a lot of people, that
55:49
Speaker 1: line in the sand was you know, a huge purple dildo.
55:54
Speaker 1: That that might be my favorite sentence ever uttered on
55:58
Speaker 1: this podcast. For a lot of the line in the
56:00
Speaker 1: sand was a purple dildo. It's pretty excellent. Meanwhile, I
56:07
Speaker 1: took pictures of this, this magazine that I was talking about.
56:12
Speaker 1: It was whatever Works, just for like everyone's oh the
56:16
Speaker 1: dildos are purple. Okay, you can't see this in the studio,
56:19
Speaker 1: but Andie is showing me the spread of the whatever
56:22
Speaker 1: Works magazine and it's it's well the art of tease me. Um,
56:30
Speaker 1: just just quite the spread. Well, we'll add it to
56:33
Speaker 1: the show notes more like that. I'm sorry, amazing, I
56:37
Speaker 1: had to document it. That's quite the magazine to flip
56:41
Speaker 1: through with your whatever works. Also good good title for
56:45
Speaker 1: a magazine, the spread about dildos. Whatever works exactly. Whatever Works.
56:52
Speaker 1: So Andy Bitch has gone from a zine to a
56:55
Speaker 1: magazine to now a nonprofit So what does what does
56:58
Speaker 1: Bitch look like? Today? Wow? Um, well we are yeah,
57:04
Speaker 1: we are a nonprofit organization. Um. We have managed to
57:10
Speaker 1: really weather a lot of um, the kind of both
57:14
Speaker 1: magazine industry downturns and you know sort of feminists you know,
57:23
Speaker 1: sort of the sort of growing pains of being a
57:26
Speaker 1: feminist organization in a time when feminism uh is really
57:32
Speaker 1: contested as really active is you know, becoming really popular
57:38
Speaker 1: and so um right now we are just trying to,
57:45
Speaker 1: you know, sort of do everything we do the best
57:48
Speaker 1: we can do it with what we have, and so
57:52
Speaker 1: we still publish a quarterly magazine. We have a very
57:58
Speaker 1: active website. We have two podcasts that we publish. We
58:04
Speaker 1: have a program called Bitch on Campus that brings speakers
58:07
Speaker 1: from from bitch Uh to colleges and universities all over
58:12
Speaker 1: North America and also works with professors and women's studies
58:17
Speaker 1: and communications departments to bring material from Bitch into the classroom.
58:24
Speaker 1: We have a new editor in chief, Yvette Dion, who's wonderful.
58:29
Speaker 1: We have a Director of Community, which we didn't have
58:33
Speaker 1: until about two years ago. We've really been able to
58:36
Speaker 1: expand in in ways that I, you know, in all
58:40
Speaker 1: my sort of pie in the sky idealism of twenty
58:45
Speaker 1: years ago really would not have imagined. And we have
58:51
Speaker 1: sort of built a community of people who to whom
58:57
Speaker 1: we feel accountable. And I think that's part of being
58:59
Speaker 1: a reader supported organization is that you know, you learn
59:03
Speaker 1: that your readers have a stake in what you do,
59:06
Speaker 1: and that you have a responsibility to them, not to
59:10
Speaker 1: you know, do everything they want, but to you know,
59:13
Speaker 1: hear their concerns and listen to what they think is
59:20
Speaker 1: important and that kind of uh symbiotic relationship has been
59:27
Speaker 1: incredibly powerful for us. And we feel really really lucky
59:32
Speaker 1: that we are still here and that we're still able
59:35
Speaker 1: to do the work that we do. Well you, I mean,
59:41
Speaker 1: I feel lucky that you're still out there doing so
59:43
Speaker 1: much great work like we we we're lucky to have
59:47
Speaker 1: such an amazing resource for current feminists, for budding feminists,
59:51
Speaker 1: for all of us. So so thank you so much
59:53
Speaker 1: for um, you know, starting this beautiful, messy, hilarious, amazing thing.
59:59
Speaker 1: And thank so much for being here on the podcast today. Yes,
1:00:03
Speaker 1: thank you for having me. This was really fun. So Andy,
1:00:05
Speaker 1: where can folks find out more about what you're up to. Well,
1:00:09
Speaker 1: bitch media dot org is a great place to start
1:00:12
Speaker 1: for for you know, bitch what we do, our programs,
1:00:16
Speaker 1: who we are, etcetera. Um, bitch Media on Twitter, we're
1:00:21
Speaker 1: very active and uh we try to really highlight not
1:00:25
Speaker 1: just what we do, but you know, sort of the
1:00:28
Speaker 1: the world of intersectional feminist media. Um, I'm personally at
1:00:33
Speaker 1: Andy Zeisler on Twitter and uh yeah, I do a
1:00:37
Speaker 1: lot of complaining on the internet, don't we all. Thanks
1:00:42
Speaker 1: again for being here, Andy, Yeah, that was so cool.
1:00:50
Speaker 1: I'm so glad we got to do that and we
1:00:52
Speaker 1: got to look a little bit more into bridgets journey
1:00:55
Speaker 1: into feminism and speaking of we would love to hear
1:00:59
Speaker 1: from you list nerds, what was your journey into feminism
1:01:03
Speaker 1: like and what was there any piece of media or
1:01:05
Speaker 1: any specific saying that helped you on this journey. We
1:01:10
Speaker 1: were thinking about doing some follow up episodes and looking
1:01:15
Speaker 1: into your responses, so please, please please let us know.
1:01:18
Speaker 1: You can find us on Instagram at a stuff mom
1:01:20
Speaker 1: Never told you. You can find us on Twitter at
1:01:23
Speaker 1: mom Stuff podcast, and we love hearing from you an
1:01:27
Speaker 1: email that is mom Stuff at how stuff works dot com.
1:01:31
Speaker 1: We'd love to hear from you. Please let us know
1:01:33
Speaker 1: what your journey to feminism was like.