A love letter to Jezebel.com
Dearest darling Jezebel,
As a sometimes angry, mostly hysterical feminist with a passion for gender politics and reproductive rights and a penchant for pretty boys and trash TV, I thought I’d never find the perfect news website for me. All the “SERIOUS FEMINIST” sites were no good for a laugh on my lunch break and the other women’s mags just made me feel fat while they tried to sell me concealer.
Then you came along. I can’t even remember how we first met, but now I can’t imagine life before you. How do I love you? Let me count the ways…
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In your manifesto you say you will “attempt to take all the essentially meaningless but sweet stuff directed our way and give it a little more meaning, while taking more the serious stuff and making it more fun, or more personal, or at the very least the subject of our highly sophisticated brand of sex joke. Basically, we wanted to make the sort of women’s magazine we’d want to read.”
Well, girl, you’ve delivered. You’re my first port of call for a snarky digest of the weekly gossip rags, a Katch-up with the Kardashians or a cuteness overdose of baby animal pictures. You denounce media misogyny, offer me practical fashion tips, and you’d never, ever call a girl fat.
You do serious, ground-breaking journalism, too. Who could forget your launch, exposing a pre-Photoshop glossy mag cover? Or your dedicated campaigning against over-Photoshopping ever since? You stand up for the right to an abortion in a country where it’s constantly under threat. You called out the violent misogyny in the way other news organisations reported the DSK rape case.
I know I’m just one in a legion of admirers – what other mainstream news site has such a engaged community of commenters? And so well-behaved! The Guardian’s Comment is Free crowd could learn a thing or two from the Jezzies.
Jezebel, you inspire me when other women’s mags make me despair. Sometimes I dream of editing a UK equivalent, full with wit and a feminist take on the news and celebs from this side of the pond. Why don’t we have one already? Where’s our Gawker Media, ready to mother something as beautiful and special as you?
So, Jezebel, if you ever want a British sister – hit me up. For now, I’ll just be checking out the weekly Thighlights…
With love,
The Postgrad
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Without wanting to be a stick in the mud, doen't Jezebel sort of epitomise many things that are wrong both with SOME feminist websites and the gawker media style in general? Essentially a lowest-common denominator approach along with a slanted editorial style that is guaranteed to appeal to its readers. Good luck finding nuanced pieces on gender at Jez, you are much more likely to find a knee jerk reaction or 'comment piece' on some ephemeral news item that is little more than a feminist spin on a headline, rather than anything thought-provoking, sincere or illuminating.
I say this as someone who read jezebel for years but stopped after realising that its essentially tabloid lvl-junk that is branded feminist and thus becomes acceptable to readers who would normally feel bad about looking at pictures of Kim Kardashian on Female. And I dont really think that calling someone fat is really a million miles away from the celebrity articles they have there, which are often snarky and critical, and certainly tread a fine line between commenting on famous womens bodies and criticising them. Also constant stream of pictures of topless men. I might have missed the memo, but is objectifying people ok now? Its hard to really argue that the particularly snarky and shallow kind of feminism, or rather feminist veneer is particular good for anyone. My problem is more that they rewrite new stories from a strident feminist angle, but that angle is usually so shallow as to offer little but an illustration of what an uniformed and unnuanced 'common sense' feminist first reaction to a news item should be. Duke case here seems like a telling example, but it is really just one of many examples of an approach to news that is 'truthieness;' that is when it coming to writing its more important that the spin 'sounds/feels correct' to a feminist standpoint, rather than actually investigate the facts. That is not a criticism of feminism or feminists, just the partisan gawker hacks at Jezebel. Essentially a Daily Mail style aimed left-leaning women?
justathoughtya Try reading The Hairpin! It's super-snarky but genuinely funny (like Jezebel was in the beginning), pitched at a much savvier, younger crowd and always has its tongue firmly in cheek. It's a lot less celeb-driven and refreshingly inclusive in a way that never feels self-righteous: an advice column called Ask a Queer Chick runs alongside hetero-oriented columns like Ask A Dude.
Also, it's post So You've Decided to Drink More Water (http://thehairpin.com/2011/08/so-youve-decided-to-drink-more-water) is a hysterical takedown of the lame "drink more water, be healthy" features you get in ladies mags, and is one of THE BEST things I've read online.
Being introduced to thighlights has made my day.
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