About the Podcast
This podcast was born out of fear for what the future holds. It was also born out of a deep and abiding belief that feminism can save us.
Fear that the global “anti-gender ideology” movement was coming for me and for everything I care about. And the people most likely to be targeted by it- LGBTQ persons and feminists and racial justice advocates- weren’t seeing the forest for the trees. They were so busy fighting the “anti-gender” “anti-trans” “anti-women” “anti-gay” “anti-migrant” “anti-Black” and “anti-woke” movements in their own communities that they didn’t realize that this was happening everywhere all at once.
I wanted to connect the dots. To show how what’s happening in Russia is related to what’s happening in Florida. And what’s happening in Mexico is related to what’s happening in Poland. I wanted to sound the alarm bell because what’s happening is a global fascist movement that is preparing for war against the enemy- and the enemy is me.
I’m a lesbian, a feminist, a professor who teaches gender studies and critical race theory. I am a mother to two young women. I have lived in Russia, a lot, and watched with horror as Vladimir Putin solidified his once shaky base of support by pointing his finger at lgbtq people and accusing us of being dangerous to children and a threat to the nation. He also shut down gender studies programs and destroyed the sort of civil society and press that could offer an alternative to his vision of the world, a world full of groomers and feminazis trying to corrupt innocent youth. I was there to see how well it worked.
I also live in the US and have watched with deepening dread as these exact same narratives and laws have spread across much of the US, whether it is Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay Law,” the attempts to defund gender studies and erase critical race theory, Tennessee’s anti-drag laws or Texas’s laws against medical care for trans youth, the anti-gender ideology movement is now deeply entrenched in US politics and culture.
But I also knew it was happening elsewhere. Mexico, Brazil, Poland, Hungary, Italy, France, and Spain to name a few places.
That’s where the feminist faith comes in. I decided to reach out to my feminist colleagues, ask them for their help, get them involved in telling this story so everyone could know: we have to organize and we have to fight back because we have everything to lose.
My colleagues Catharine Wright and Patricia Saldarriaga, professors with me at Middlebury College, were the first two feminists to jump on board. Documentary filmmaker Alison Segar immediately rolled up her sleeves to help with the tech. Journalist and writer Judith Levine asked what she could do to help.
And so we became a feminist collective with lots of room for other feminists to join us. Every day we are bringing in more and more feminist scholars, activists, and artists to talk about this global fascist movement.
By connecting the dots and seeing how this fascism operates by making us the enemy, but also by trying to get us to fight one another, we hope to change the future. One feminist episode at a time.
But the point isn’t just to describe the world, it is to change it. We are hoping these episodes will motivate you to organize and fight back as feminists for all marginalized bodies, which is to say, the bodies targeted by fascism.
About the People
Laurie Essig
Laurie Essig is Professor of Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies at Middlebury College. Her first book, Queer in Russia: A Story of Sex, Self and the Other (Duke, 1999) considered how sexual others are imagined and thus imagine themselves in Russia. Her second book, American Plastic: Credit Cards, Boob Jobs and Our Quest for Perfection (Beacon, 2010) argued that cosmetic surgery in the US is the subprime mortgage crisis of the body, with corporations squeezing profit from working class Americans who hope a more perfect body will lead to a better future.. Her most recent book, Love, Inc.: Dating Apps, the Big White Wedding, and Chasing the Happily Neverafter argues that romance as an ideology became even more powerful in the last few decades even as actual marriage rates declined. Romance promises us a safe and secure future as a private love affair even as our future is more and more precarious. Essig has written for a variety of publications including the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Conversation and the Boston Globe. This is her first attempt to do a podcast. Fortunately, she’s got a lot of help.
Catharine Wright
Catharine Wright is Associate Professor of Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies and director of the Writing and Rhetoric Program at Middlebury College. She teaches courses such as Writing Gender and Sexuality, Writing Race and Class, and Feminist Joy. She’s co-author and editor of two books, one on social justice education, and has published feminist and queer short fiction, poems and essays in journals and literary magazines such as Blue Mesa Review, Pleiades, Feminist Studies, The Feminist Wire, Narrative Northeast and Hurricane Alice. She believes in truth telling, solidarity across marginalized groups, the power of imagination, regenerative farming, and hope in the face of fear. She is an eighth generation Vermonter, raised a queer blended family, and loves contributing to the work and vision of Feminism, Fascism and the Future.
Alison Segar
I am a feminist, independent documentary film maker and for 35 plus years a social worker. I am also passionate about screen printing, language justice, my dog, my kids and my girlfriend… (not necessarily in that order)! My first film “and i am me” played at film festivals around the world including Frameline (USA), GAZE (Ireland), Inside/Out (Canada), Zinegoak (Spain), and Vinokino (Finland). I founded the Vermont Language Justice Project in 2020 when covid hit and I realized that the only life saving health information was being disseminated in English. Three years on and over 2000 videos later we have a thriving project where we work in 17 languages. You can find out more about it here. This is the first podcast I have been involved in and not only do I want to have fun making it, I want to learn tons about how the dots are all connected and figure out how to tell a story just using voices.
Harper Nichols
Harper Nichols is a student at Middlebury College studying psychology, gender studies, and studio art. They have a keen interest in feminist media and the power of art and story-telling. Hailing from Cleveland, Ohio, they are a proud midwest lesbian whose parents have instilled in them a love of the outdoors, board games, and the Indigo Girls. They are so excited to be working on this project and contributing to a feminist future. You can check out more of their creative work here.
Mishka
Mishka is Laurie’s baby and our favorite podcast cheerleader! She loves to listen to intense feminist conversations (a constant) and losing her toys under the sofa. We LOVE you, Mishka!