Ann Friedman is one of the editors of my favorite feminist blog, feministing, where she writes the Weekly Feminist Reader (“I know what I’m looking forward to doing this holiday season? Putting on my finest party dress, lying down on the floor, and lovingly stroking all the cleaning devices I’ve been given!”).
Friedman is reliably witty, sharp, and someone with whom I’d like to grab a drink. I imagine if we did, it would go something like this (her responses are real quotations from her articles):
Ann: “AP nominates two horses for ‘Female Athlete of the Year‘! The Associated Press recently published the vote tallies for its Female Athlete of the Year, in which 158 sports editors around the country weigh in on which of these ten female athletes deserves the title.”
Elissa: Among them are Serena Williams, Zenyatta, and Rachel Alexandra. The last two are horses.
Ann: “Was it really so hard to find ten athletes who are women?”
***
Ann: I am against the Lysistrata approach.
Elissa: Rock the Vote is running a campaign asking young people to pledge to not have sex for some crazy reason. What does the video say?
Ann: “‘We pledge ourselves to the health and liberty of young Americans and to government for the people… and to never fucking you if you are against us… We will vote against you, work against you, and once again, just in case you forgot, never ever, never ever, never ever, never ever fuck you.'”
Elissa: Never ever.
Ann: “At its core, this is basically the Lysistrata approach–a reference to the Greek comedy in which women withhold sex until men negotiate peace.”
Elissa: Yeah, I saw Lysistrata performed in college. Withholding sex until men did something I wanted/needed didn’t do much to improve my dating life or the government.
Ann: “With varying degrees of seriousness, I admit I have advised friends not to have sex with people who don’t believe they should have reproductive rights… Which is why, despite having some pretty strong personal beliefs about the required political views of my sexual partners, I can’t get behind any effort (tongue-in-cheek or not) to use sex as a means of widespread political leverage. Especially when it comes with bonus pro-abstinence and anti-trans messaging like the Rock the Vote campaign.”
Elissa: Similarly, I can’t get behind any effort to do tongue-in-cheek sex.
