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Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Stuff.

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Speaker 2: I've never told you a protection of iHeartRadio, and today

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Speaker 2: we have a very special treat I will say, a

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Speaker 2: bonus episode because, as you've heard us discuss, we do

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Speaker 2: have a book coming out on August twenty ninth. You

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Speaker 2: can preorder it now Stuff you should read books dot com.

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Speaker 2: But we also have an audiobook that you can pre

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Speaker 2: order at the same place that is really really cool,

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Speaker 2: and it was in some ways kind of challenging because

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Speaker 2: we had never done something like this before. Samantha and I.

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Speaker 2: We worked with a very talented, amazing team, but Samantha

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Speaker 2: and I new new and they were very kind and

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Speaker 2: just a lovely group of people to work with and

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Speaker 2: had so many great ideas, and one of them revolved

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Speaker 2: around the A lot of the chapters start with a

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Speaker 2: graphic novel portion, and we as a team had to

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Speaker 2: figure out how we were going to translate that into

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Speaker 2: an audio format into this audiobook and the result was

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Speaker 2: just a really beautifully soundscaped section that's narrated by Unicewang,

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Speaker 2: who did an amazing job, and it was just so

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Speaker 2: cool to hear. It was so like, oh, look at

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Speaker 2: this they brought it to life.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it was. It was very nerve wrecking, yeah, but

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Speaker 1: overwhelming and good moment to hear it come together. I

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Speaker 1: think we've talked about how anxious we've been the entire

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Speaker 1: time and then like freaking out about what are we doing?

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Speaker 1: Why are we doing this? And then seeing the finish

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Speaker 1: product or almost finished product. Yeah, it's made us really proud.

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Speaker 1: And seeing the way that the people who we've worked

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Speaker 1: with and who have helped us through this process really

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Speaker 1: back us and supportives in this it's been amazing. But yeah,

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Speaker 1: so it's been an interesting, long, but honestly rewarding process

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Speaker 1: to see how it's turned out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it really really has, and it's it was such

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Speaker 2: a beautiful collaboration between so many people to make this happen.

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Speaker 1: Who are only women like that? I needed to shout

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Speaker 1: that out. I was very I think we told them

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Speaker 1: from the jump, like we want to work with as

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Speaker 1: many women as possible or those who identify or non

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Speaker 1: binary people because that's that's what our show's about and

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Speaker 1: we want to hold to that. And then as we

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Speaker 1: meet more and more of the staff, whether it's on

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Speaker 1: the publisher side or the audio publishing side, they've all

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Speaker 1: been women. We're like, wow, this is this is amazing,

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Speaker 1: Thank you.

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Speaker 2: It really was. Honestly so much support we've received too

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Speaker 2: from them, so we're very happy to share this with you.

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Speaker 2: So this is going to be a chapter that Samantha

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Speaker 2: largely worked on, but in every chapter we kind of

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Speaker 2: both have a little bit.

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Speaker 1: It's our trademark way of like obviously one person, but

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Speaker 1: the other adds their personality to it every time and

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Speaker 1: adds so much support. I will say I feel like

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Speaker 1: this was the beginning of us planning this book. This

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Speaker 1: chapter was the first like, how about we do it

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Speaker 1: this way? Because we wanted to be a little different

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Speaker 1: and we want to change it up a little bit,

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Speaker 1: not just be a history book necessarily. What does this

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Speaker 1: look like? And also how does this fit our personality

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Speaker 1: because we're not just always straightforward this and this. We

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Speaker 1: have a lot of our opinions coming out, and though

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Speaker 1: this is a book, we wanted to do it in

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Speaker 1: a way that was a little more abstract, a little

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Speaker 1: more creative. I think this chapter was kind of the

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Speaker 1: beginning catalystm like, that's do it this way and us

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Speaker 1: falling in love with the idea of our book.

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Speaker 2: It really was, and it's a fascinating history. So it's

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Speaker 2: all about the pantsuit revolution.

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Speaker 1: And I want to go ahead and put this disclaimer

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Speaker 1: right here again. We've talked about the fact that we

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Speaker 1: wrote this in twenty twenty. Things were changing very quickly.

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Speaker 1: We did it in less than six months, and we

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Speaker 1: really did not have a lot of time to correct

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Speaker 1: and change things as it went along, even though we

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Speaker 1: were like, we want to add so much more, and

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Speaker 1: as we do when it comes to current affairs when

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Speaker 1: we talk about our own episodes, we couldn't add, like, oh, no,

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Speaker 1: things are constantly changing and there's already an update. Because

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Speaker 1: by the time we finally finalized this chapter and then

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Speaker 1: we started talking about the audiobook, literally, Missouri lawmakers and

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Speaker 1: Congress themselves made this ridiculous law for making it stricter

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Speaker 1: for women and the dress code and the assembly in

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Speaker 1: which this chapter talks a lot about for women in

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Speaker 1: Congress and how it really held women back from being

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Speaker 1: a part of Congress, and we were like, damn it,

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Speaker 1: I need to add this in there, and I couldn't.

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Speaker 2: But yeah, yes, yes, so many times that happened. And

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Speaker 2: that is just the process of writing a book that

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Speaker 2: deals with a lot of current affairs that impacts a

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Speaker 2: lot of people. So yes, we are aware, but still

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Speaker 2: still very important and worth talking about. So we hope

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Speaker 2: that you enjoy this sample chapter from the audiobook Stefan

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Speaker 2: Never Told You The Feminist Past, Present and Feature.

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Speaker 1: Chapter two, The Pantsuit Revolution.

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Speaker 2: This is supposed to be the year of the women

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Speaker 2: in the Senate. Let's see how they do. I hope

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Speaker 2: a lot of them lose. George H. W. Bush, upon

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Speaker 2: being asked when his party might nominate a woman for president.

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Speaker 1: Spiny warning brief mention of rape and sexual assault, that

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Speaker 1: shaming ableism.

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Speaker 3: December seventeenth, nineteen sixty nine, Washington, d C. Here this

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Speaker 3: is from all of us. This is from me. Oh my,

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Speaker 3: I think I need to show these pants off at

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Speaker 3: the next house meeting. You have got to a week later.

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Speaker 3: You guys have to come see this representative Reed is

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Speaker 3: wearing the pants that we got her. What. Yes, she

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Speaker 3: looks so stunning. Also wearing my pants today. I was

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Speaker 3: told there was a lady here in trousers, so I

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Speaker 3: had to come over and see for myself. That is

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Speaker 3: a very nice suit. You should definitely wear it more often.

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Speaker 3: I hear it's very in now. Yes, Representative Reid, You've

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Speaker 3: got beautiful taste, wonderful. It was a last minute idea

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Speaker 3: that I just thought was fun. But I didn't wear

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Speaker 3: pants again. I didn't want to take away the femininity

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Speaker 3: of the women in the house, even though I do

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Speaker 3: think pants are feminine. Looking on Danielle's first day, she

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Speaker 3: is nervous when she walks in, but she is ready

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Speaker 3: to go. It's hard to believe that she's made it

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Speaker 3: this far. Congresswoman Carol Moseley Braun is the first black

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Speaker 3: woman senator in the country, and Danielle has been along

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Speaker 3: for the ride since the early days of her campaign.

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Speaker 3: Over the weekend, Danielle and some other staffers have helped

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Speaker 3: situate the Senator in her new office, so Danielle has

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Speaker 3: already been able to introduce herself to many of her

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Speaker 3: new colleagues. Apparently they work weekends. Soon enough, she'll discover

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Speaker 3: that they seem to never leave work. But that was

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Speaker 3: the weekend and it was all pretty low key. Today

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Speaker 3: is the first day of sessions, so the energy in

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Speaker 3: the office is high. Danielle quietly trails Senator Moseley Braun

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Speaker 3: down the hall as she shakes hands and greets her colleagues,

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Speaker 3: but at the door to the Senate chamber, they are

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Speaker 3: stopped by the doorkeeper, an older gentleman who has been

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Speaker 3: working there for years now. I'm sorry, ma'am, but you

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Speaker 3: can't come in. Moseley Braun responds, confused but polite. Excuse me,

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Speaker 3: I'm a senator and need to be here for the session.

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Speaker 3: I understand, ma'am, but you and your staff aren't in

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Speaker 3: the appropriate attire to be on the floor and will

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Speaker 3: need to change. Senator Moseley Braun stopped in her tracks

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Speaker 3: with a shocked look on her face. The staff murmured

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Speaker 3: concerned questions at one another as the hallway filled with

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Speaker 3: other senators and aides piling up behind them. Many of

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Speaker 3: those trying to squeeze by were men in similar attire,

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Speaker 3: none of whom seemed to be concerned with what was happening.

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Speaker 3: When Moseley Braun asked again what the problem was, the

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Speaker 3: doorkeeper informed her that women were not permitted to wear

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Speaker 3: pants on the floor, that she and her staff were

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Speaker 3: the problem. The senator, confused and annoyed and a bit embarrassed,

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Speaker 3: moved to the side with her staff to discuss how

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Speaker 3: to proceed. After a quick, hushed discussion, Senator Moseley Braun

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Speaker 3: decided to stay. She told Danielle and the others that

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Speaker 3: she hadn't brought any other outfit, and there was no

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Speaker 3: precedent for this rule. It was mere tradition, and weren't

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Speaker 3: traditions just dated suggestions. After an awkward pause, the doorkeeper

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Speaker 3: begrudgingly allowed her in. The judging glances from her male

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Speaker 3: counterparts made it clear that this discussion was far from over.

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Speaker 3: She ignored them and went about her work, but she

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Speaker 3: already knew the male senators would be whispering about her

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Speaker 3: attire in the days and weeks to come. After the

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Speaker 3: session closed, Moseley Braun returned to her office. All her

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Speaker 3: staffers wanted to know what had happened? Did anyone say anything?

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Speaker 3: What do we do? How do we move forward? What

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Speaker 3: should we say? One of Danielle's colleagues jumped in, reminding

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Speaker 3: them that this issue had been discussed in the past,

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Speaker 3: didn't they all remember? Representative Charlotte read, this wasn't the

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Speaker 3: first time a woman had worn pants on the floor

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Speaker 3: of Congress, and if the House could modernize, why not

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Speaker 3: the Senate? In fact, wasn't this a good thing? This

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Speaker 3: was Moseley Braun's chair to move this conversation forward, or,

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Speaker 3: better yet, finish it for good. The staffers all agreed

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Speaker 3: that it was long past time to change some archaic

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Speaker 3: ideas that had existed for far too long. Wardrobe requirements,

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Speaker 3: the most onerous of which were aimed strictly at women,

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Speaker 3: seemed designed to further control and undermine the women who

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Speaker 3: had worked so hard to make it to a leadership

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Speaker 3: position in government, and that didn't seem right. The conversation

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Speaker 3: went on. The recent Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill hearing

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Speaker 3: had inflamed tension between men and women in government positions,

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Speaker 3: with many women asking aloud how long it might take

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Speaker 3: and what other rules they might need to bend before

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Speaker 3: they could feel comfortable in these bastions of male power.

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Speaker 3: The senator allowed everyone their turn to speak, then asked

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Speaker 3: Danielle to look deeper into the question. Were these antiquated

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Speaker 3: rules truly written down somewhere. As the first black woman

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Speaker 3: elected to the Senate in the United States, Moseley Braun

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Speaker 3: was no stranger to controversy or being made to feel

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Speaker 3: uncomfortable in rooms filled with white men. But all the

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Speaker 3: Senator wanted to do was get down to business. Danielle

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Speaker 3: stayed late that night and the next doing her work

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Speaker 3: and drafting a memo to share with the senator. She

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Speaker 3: thought it was long past time to cause a stir,

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Speaker 3: to make some trouble. She had no idea whether the

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Speaker 3: Senator would go along, but she took a deep breath

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Speaker 3: and turned in her memo. The next morning, the senator

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Speaker 3: called the staffers together. Senator Moseley Braun went over the

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Speaker 3: implications of causing such a stir over an outfit. Was

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Speaker 3: it even worth pushing forward with it or should she

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Speaker 3: just let it go? Did it even matter? But in

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Speaker 3: the end they all agreed it was time to shake

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Speaker 3: things up. Let's cause some trouble for the next session.

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Speaker 3: They all agreed to wear pantsuits, staff and senators alike

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Speaker 3: to show a united front. The senator reached out to

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Speaker 3: a couple of her colleagues, other female senators, who agreed

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Speaker 3: to go along with the plan because they too had

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Speaker 3: been thinking of pushing the issue. Danielle and the other

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Speaker 3: staffers were thrilled. It felt like they had all stayed

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Speaker 3: silent for far too long. It was time for real change.

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Speaker 3: When the day arrived, all the women in pantsuits, young

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Speaker 3: and old, masked outside Senator Moseley Braun's office, all smiles

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Speaker 3: and laughter. They could sense that this was a big moment,

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Speaker 3: that they were about to make a difference, not just

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Speaker 3: for women in the Senate, but for women in realms

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Speaker 3: of male power everywhere. They all began the walk together,

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Speaker 3: some of them holding hands or linking elbows, headed to

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Speaker 3: the chamber, talking excitedly. But once they arrived, they were

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Speaker 3: met with a shocking sight. Not only was the doorkeeper

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Speaker 3: standing in front of the chambers door, arms crossed in

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Speaker 3: front of him, he was accompanied by about twelve male senators.

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Speaker 3: They stood shoulder to shoulder, arms folded, faces serious. One

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Speaker 3: was holding a petition signed by what looked like every

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Speaker 3: man in the Senate, that put the hated rule down

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Speaker 3: in black and white for the first time, women will

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Speaker 3: not wear pants in the Senate Chamber. The men turned,

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Speaker 3: walked into the chamber and closed the heavy doors firmly

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Speaker 3: behind them. Rules are rules, said the doorkeeper, shrugging, and

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Speaker 3: he took up his position in front of the closed doors.

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Speaker 3: The women stood silently, waiting in disbelief for their moment

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Speaker 3: to argue their case, but it never came.

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Speaker 1: But that's not what happened that day in the Senate

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Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety three. Those women walked right through the

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Speaker 1: door in what would soon be known as the pants

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Speaker 1: suit Revolution. The long standing tradition no women in pants

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Speaker 1: had never been a formal rule, and these brave women

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Speaker 1: finally decided to change that tradition. Despite the lack of

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Speaker 1: a written rule in the Congressional dress Code forbidding women

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Speaker 1: from wearing pants, it had long been enforced as an

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Speaker 1: unspoken rule, and it wasn't until Senator Moseley Braun, who

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Speaker 1: at the time didn't know about this silly unspoken rule.

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Speaker 1: Senator Barbara mcculsky and Senator Nancy Casbaum decided together to

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Speaker 1: speak out that the issue was brought to everyone's attention.

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Speaker 1: Women had long been denied access to Congressional sessions due

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Speaker 1: to their outfits, and not just when someone dared to

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Speaker 1: wear pants at one point in time. In fact, the

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Speaker 1: rules of Congress were so stringent that there were provisions

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Speaker 1: about how freely a woman's outfit could be if the

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Speaker 1: doorkeepers felt that a woman's choice of clothing was not

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Speaker 1: in line with their modesty standards bare arms, for example,

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Speaker 1: or even if they just didn't like the dress, skirt, shoes,

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Speaker 1: or jewelry a woman was wearing, they could bar that

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Speaker 1: woman from entry. That happened so often, in fact, that

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Speaker 1: a lot of the staffers carried multiple outfits just to

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Speaker 1: appease these all powerful doorkeepers. Although the House had already

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Speaker 1: started to allow women to wear a pantsuit instead of

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Speaker 1: a dress or skirt back in the eighties, the Senate,

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Speaker 1: which did not have many women within its rings, did

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Speaker 1: not acquiesce to this new fangled idea of women being

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Speaker 1: allowed to dress for comfort and convenience, while men were

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Speaker 1: permitted to dress more casually on weekends khakis and a blazer.

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Speaker 1: The women's staff were still expected to wear skirts and dresses,

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Speaker 1: but things were changing in Congress little by little. The

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Speaker 1: previous year, nineteen ninety two, had been deemed the Year

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Speaker 1: of the Woman, after the November elections had brought several

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Speaker 1: more women into the Senate, where previously there had only

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Speaker 1: been two women. It was a year that many spent

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Speaker 1: holding their breadth, hoping that more and more women would

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Speaker 1: start showing up, become more vocal leaders, and blossom into

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Speaker 1: powerhouses within the feminist movement. Although many, like former President

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Speaker 1: Bush Senior, as he made clear in the quote at

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Speaker 1: the beginning of the chapter, marked the idea of women

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Speaker 1: being in leadership positions, the year of the woman did

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Speaker 1: in fact make a difference. This wasn't the first time

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Speaker 1: that pants had become such a controversial topic within politics.

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Speaker 1: Several women within the suffragette movement tried using pants as

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Speaker 1: the metaphor source as they fought for women's voting rights.

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth Katie Stanton, Amelia Bloomer, and Elizabeth Smith Miller, three

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Speaker 1: prominent women in the movement, are credited with being the

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Speaker 1: first to wear a new style of trousers. In eighteen

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Speaker 1: fifty one, Miller apparently arrived for a visit with her

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Speaker 1: cousin Katie Stanton, wearing a daring new outfit. It was

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Speaker 1: described as Turkish trousers to the ankle, with a skirt

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Speaker 1: reaching some four inches below the knee. Miller explained that

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Speaker 1: she had had enough of tripping over her long skirt,

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Speaker 1: so she decided to do the unthinkable and lose the

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Speaker 1: shackles of the heavy, stifling skirt women usually wore at

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Speaker 1: that time. Bloomer and Stanton were thrilled with the idea,

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Speaker 1: and then immediately started planning to make their own versions

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Speaker 1: of what they had already nicknamed freedom dresses. Bloomer was

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Speaker 1: so excited that she published an editorial to praise this

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Speaker 1: new clothing item in April eighteen fifty one. Soon enough,

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Speaker 1: requests from women around the nation started flooding in begging

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Speaker 1: for the pattern of these new outfits. In the wake

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Speaker 1: of our editorial, the new garment got a new name.

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Speaker 1: Women all over the country were wearing Bloomers. Of course,

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Speaker 1: it didn't take long before the critics, most of whom

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Speaker 1: were horrified, began to attack and mock this new fashion.

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Speaker 1: The term Bloomerism was used both to indicate with some disdain,

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Speaker 1: that women were suddenly wearing trousers for the first time

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Speaker 1: in public, and to imply that any woman who did

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Speaker 1: so was corrupt and deviant. Bloomer wearers were, according to

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Speaker 1: the disapproving men, women who smoked, gambled, drank, and eventually

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Speaker 1: would abandon their families to live this wayward life. This

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Speaker 1: traditionally male clothing item being usurped by women also seemed

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Speaker 1: to imply all the ways in which women were trying

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Speaker 1: to usurp the rights of men, for example, the right

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Speaker 1: to vote. In the face of withering criticism, these brave

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Speaker 1: women were booed at, yelled at, and accused of trying

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Speaker 1: to destroy the traditional family, and harmed the reputations of

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Speaker 1: their own husbands and families. Eventually, the abuse got so

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Speaker 1: bad that even Miller and Stanton, in the hopes of

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Speaker 1: salvaging their momentum towards suffrage, abandoned the Bloomers, sometimes referred

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Speaker 1: to as the short Dress Stanton told a friend, had

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Speaker 1: I counted the cost of the short dress, I would

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Speaker 1: never have put it on. They had come to believe

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Speaker 1: that the attempt to change fashion norms for women may

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Speaker 1: have harmed their cause more than it helped. Once it

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Speaker 1: had become too big a distraction from the real issues

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Speaker 1: they were trying to address, most of the women in

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Speaker 1: the movement reverted to a more feminine style of attire

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Speaker 1: in the hopes of attracting less attention rather than more.

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Speaker 1: They were rebranding themselves as respectable so that they would

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Speaker 1: be taken more seriously and pushed through the bigger change

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Speaker 1: they were seeking. It would take well over a century

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Speaker 1: and many more brave women pushing for change to get

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Speaker 1: us to that weekend in nineteen ninety three when those

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Speaker 1: brazen female senators and their staffs walked into the Senate

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Speaker 1: Chamber wearing pants refusing to be kept out of the

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Speaker 1: seats of power. In the aftermath of that moment, we

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Speaker 1: have seen the ever rising power of the pants suit.

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Speaker 1: It is the de facto powerbroker uniform and is worn

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Speaker 1: by powerful women everywhere, from leaders like Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi,

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Speaker 1: and Vice President Kamala Harris to fashion icons and celebrities

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Speaker 1: like the Kardashian sisters Beyonce and Julia Roberts. There are

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Speaker 1: so many expectations around women's fashion choices that still need

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Speaker 1: to be changed, from uneven enforcement of dress codes and

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Speaker 1: schools to rampant victim blaming for women's clothing choices. Though

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Speaker 1: what does she think was going to happen wearing a

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Speaker 1: skirt like that? But the pants suit rebellion brought widespread

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Speaker 1: awareness to the uneven standards placed on women not only

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Speaker 1: in Congress but beyond, and though being allowed to wear

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Speaker 1: pantsuits in Congress may seem trivial to some, the bigger

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Speaker 1: issue at hand is what remained unsaid during the controversy.

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Speaker 1: The rules about pants were being used as a way

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Speaker 1: of silencing women and diminishing the seriousness and legitimacy of

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Speaker 1: women in power. By criticizing and policing the way a

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Speaker 1: woman is permitted to dress, those in charge undermined the

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Speaker 1: work these women were doing. Filled with the subtle and

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Speaker 1: not so subtle ways, men have banned women from positions

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Speaker 1: of authority or attempted to marginalize their presence in the

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Speaker 1: room once they've finally been allowed in. The patriarchy has

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Speaker 1: made clear that it will take whatever opportunity can to

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Speaker 1: quash the ac crew of female power in whatever way

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Speaker 1: it can. And yes, there is progress, but as always,

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Speaker 1: it is slow and often halting. In twenty twenty, we

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Speaker 1: had the largest number of women in history elected to Congress,

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Speaker 1: but even so, there are seventeen states in the US

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Speaker 1: that have never elected a woman as a representative in government.

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Speaker 1: We have had many first though, including the first Native

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Speaker 1: woman to be appointed as Cabinet Secretary Secretary Deb Holland

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Speaker 1: of the Department of the Interior, the first openly gay

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Speaker 1: person elected to the Senate, Senator Tammy Baldwin from Wisconsin,

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Speaker 1: and of course, the first woman and woman of color

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Speaker 1: to be vice president Vice President Kamala Harris, among many others.

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Speaker 1: And I'm proud and grateful and all the things I

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Speaker 1: swear it, But sometimes I pause and think, is twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty three, y'all? Weren't we supposed to be jutting around

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Speaker 1: and flying cars by now? And yet we still haven't

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Speaker 1: had a female president in this country. There are so

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Speaker 1: many important roles that have yet to be filled by women.

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Speaker 1: We'll just have to wait a little bit longer. Nevertheless,

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Speaker 1: damn it, we will persist journal injury. Did you know

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Speaker 1: that in twenty seventeen, the women of the House decided

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Speaker 1: to rebel against some of the other dress codes they

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Speaker 1: felt were unfair, such as the rule against wearing open

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Speaker 1: toad shoes or a sleeveless top. They put out word

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Speaker 1: that it would be hashtags sleeveless Friday, and at least

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Speaker 1: twenty five women showed up in sleeveless attire to protest

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Speaker 1: the old school rules. The then Speaker of the House,

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Speaker 1: Paul Ryan, agreed to take a look at the dress code,

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Speaker 1: but made sure he avoided any blame for the situation.

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Speaker 1: He said, this is nothing new and certainly not something

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Speaker 1: that I devised. At the same time, that doesn't mean

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Speaker 1: that the enforcement couldn't stand to be a bit modernized.

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Speaker 1: Of course, he also added that people should be inappropriate attire.

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Speaker 1: But as we know throughout history, it seems that only

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Speaker 1: men get to dictate what is deemed appropriate, and that

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Speaker 1: continues to be true today, whether in school, workplace, or

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Speaker 1: even on the damn plane remember that bizarre leggings on

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Speaker 1: a plane scandal of twenty seventeen. On social media and

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Speaker 1: in real life, there is constant scrutiny of the idea

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Speaker 1: of what is appropriate, and almost all the judgment is

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Speaker 1: aimed at women. We just keep having to justify our bodies,

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Speaker 1: our lifestyles, and our existence. The patriarchy keeps getting to

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Speaker 1: decide social boundaries and social norms. Who can wear a dress,

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Speaker 1: how short, what color? Requests for modesty abound. Women shouldn't

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Speaker 1: dress in ways that might distract a man and lead

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Speaker 1: him to behave badly right, we have been told that

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Speaker 1: women flaunting their bodies can be blamed for the downfall

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Speaker 1: of men. Women's clothing has been blamed for anything from

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Speaker 1: bad grades and bad behavior in school to assault and rape.

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Speaker 1: Why when a woman gets assaulted is one of the

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Speaker 1: first questions, what was she wearing? For as many steps

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Speaker 1: forward as we have made as a society, there have

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Speaker 1: been just as many setbacks. When we talk about dress codes,

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Speaker 1: we may not always recognize the misogyny that motivates these codes.

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Speaker 1: Perhaps it seems like a small thing, but as we

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Speaker 1: look at the people who are most affected by the

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Speaker 1: dress codes, we start to see patterns. Whether it's a

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Speaker 1: way of requiring a specific gender to follow more stringent

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Speaker 1: rules which often makes it more difficult for them to

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Speaker 1: advance in their career or filled see doorkeepers in congress,

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Speaker 1: or a way of labeling certain students as troublemakers due

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Speaker 1: to what they wear. Students can be labeled or targeted

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Speaker 1: for their fashion choice. Goth or hip hop styles, for example,

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Speaker 1: are considered less acceptable to some. Sometimes the powers that

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00:26:24,119 --> 00:26:28,120
Speaker 1: be just use someone's clothes or hairstyles typically black hair

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Speaker 1: styles perhaps, or clothing styles popularized by hip hop as

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Speaker 1: an excuse to hold someone back or prevent them from

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Speaker 1: getting the protection or the justice they deserve. Both good

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Speaker 1: news and bad news have come from this age of

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Speaker 1: social media and twenty four hour online access. The good

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Speaker 1: news is that we are exposed to more looks, styles,

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Speaker 1: and diverse content than ever before. We see boys putting

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Speaker 1: on makeup on YouTube, amassing huge followings. We see gender

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Speaker 1: non conforming individuals loaded for their fashion sense, and all

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Speaker 1: kinds of folks breaking new boundaries when it comes to clothing,

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Speaker 1: hair and makeup. But there's bad news too. There are

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Speaker 1: still gatekeepers, and nowadays there seem to be so many

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Speaker 1: more of them trying to keep us women in line.

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00:27:16,320 --> 00:27:22,520
Speaker 1: Online trolls, cometers, and fans have no problem fat shaming celebrities, influencers,

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Speaker 1: and regular people alike. The unrealistic expectations of looking perfect

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Speaker 1: at all times has skyrocketed. Though many are fighting the

431
00:27:31,480 --> 00:27:35,920
Speaker 1: good fight, attempting to promote more realistic and relatable content,

432
00:27:36,359 --> 00:27:40,320
Speaker 1: including the body positive movement, there's no escaping the constant

433
00:27:40,320 --> 00:27:43,560
Speaker 1: expectations for us to look a certain perfect way, an

434
00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:46,080
Speaker 1: expectation that has been shaped by the mel gaze and

435
00:27:46,119 --> 00:27:51,560
Speaker 1: mal rules and regulations for centuries. No matter how many

436
00:27:51,600 --> 00:27:54,600
Speaker 1: influencers and experts tell us that it's more important to

437
00:27:54,640 --> 00:27:57,320
Speaker 1: be healthy and happy, the vast majority of what we

438
00:27:57,359 --> 00:28:01,800
Speaker 1: see and share tells us otherwise. Beyond that isn't even

439
00:28:01,920 --> 00:28:05,720
Speaker 1: less understood, yet far more widespread. Blindness to the prevalence

440
00:28:05,760 --> 00:28:09,840
Speaker 1: of ablest narratives which not only exclude so many, but

441
00:28:09,960 --> 00:28:14,160
Speaker 1: oftentimes just outright dinnergrade or ignore those in the disabled community.

442
00:28:14,880 --> 00:28:17,560
Speaker 1: Let's not even start talking about what is available in

443
00:28:17,600 --> 00:28:21,199
Speaker 1: the world of fashion for those in that community. And

444
00:28:21,359 --> 00:28:24,880
Speaker 1: this type of inaccessibility happens in the plus sized community

445
00:28:24,920 --> 00:28:28,960
Speaker 1: as well. The clothing and fashion industry ignores, abuses, or

446
00:28:29,000 --> 00:28:33,280
Speaker 1: takes advantage of those who are outside societal expectations. I mean,

447
00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:37,480
Speaker 1: when Beyonce first started out, designers were refusing to dress

448
00:28:37,480 --> 00:28:42,080
Speaker 1: her because she didn't conform to standard industry sizing. Now,

449
00:28:42,280 --> 00:28:45,040
Speaker 1: of course they are clamoring to do so. But if

450
00:28:45,080 --> 00:28:47,760
Speaker 1: you need to actually be Beyonce in order to live

451
00:28:47,800 --> 00:28:52,880
Speaker 1: outside societies accepted body expectations, how can we the normies

452
00:28:53,280 --> 00:28:58,320
Speaker 1: even hope to try. Recently, we have started to see

453
00:28:58,360 --> 00:29:02,040
Speaker 1: celebrities and influencers speaking out about how fat phobia and

454
00:29:02,120 --> 00:29:06,240
Speaker 1: body dysmorphia have become dangerous within our culture. People have

455
00:29:06,280 --> 00:29:08,960
Speaker 1: become vocal in the fight to shut down the unfortunate

456
00:29:09,040 --> 00:29:13,000
Speaker 1: kinds of practices that exclude those from the plus sis communities,

457
00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:15,920
Speaker 1: such as labeling anyone who doesn't fit a specific standard

458
00:29:15,920 --> 00:29:19,800
Speaker 1: of beauty in a derogatory manner. As a result of

459
00:29:19,840 --> 00:29:23,200
Speaker 1: this increasing awareness, there seems to be more acceptance of

460
00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:26,160
Speaker 1: the idea that past standards of female beauty are not

461
00:29:26,280 --> 00:29:31,920
Speaker 1: realistic and oftentimes harmful for so many women. But still

462
00:29:32,280 --> 00:29:35,720
Speaker 1: the gatekeepers of the fashion industry continue to perpetuate the

463
00:29:35,840 --> 00:29:39,320
Speaker 1: overall sexist agenda by controlling what people wear and how

464
00:29:39,320 --> 00:29:42,480
Speaker 1: they can wear it. How do we break this down?

465
00:29:43,160 --> 00:29:46,200
Speaker 1: How do we try to delete years of misogynistic and

466
00:29:46,280 --> 00:29:50,360
Speaker 1: ablest mindsets so we can start over. How can we

467
00:29:50,440 --> 00:29:54,200
Speaker 1: stop gendering clothes and stop policing what we think someone

468
00:29:54,480 --> 00:29:58,040
Speaker 1: is or is not allowed to wear. How do we

469
00:29:58,080 --> 00:30:01,080
Speaker 1: build a world in which we all ignores centuries of

470
00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:07,120
Speaker 1: control and the attendant judgment and encourage everyone to feel good, beautiful, comfortable,

471
00:30:07,640 --> 00:30:10,680
Speaker 1: or maybe just a little bit human for a while.

472
00:30:12,880 --> 00:30:17,800
Speaker 2: Fictional woman's side note. In nineteen ninety three, the hit

473
00:30:17,960 --> 00:30:22,000
Speaker 2: sci fi show The X Files debuted, featuring Jillian Anderson

474
00:30:22,040 --> 00:30:26,760
Speaker 2: as FBI officer Dana Scully. Scully not only played against

475
00:30:26,760 --> 00:30:30,400
Speaker 2: type for women, the skeptic to Fox Mulder's believer, but

476
00:30:30,480 --> 00:30:35,480
Speaker 2: became a queer icon. I for one, remember being in

477
00:30:35,480 --> 00:30:38,560
Speaker 2: middle school very confused as to why I was attracted

478
00:30:38,600 --> 00:30:43,440
Speaker 2: to both Molder and Scully. She also became a fashion

479
00:30:43,720 --> 00:30:47,560
Speaker 2: icon with her pants, suits, shoulder pads, and patterned slacks

480
00:30:47,840 --> 00:30:52,760
Speaker 2: so called competence core. Some argued that this displayed Scully's

481
00:30:52,840 --> 00:30:55,640
Speaker 2: need to wear masculine style clothes to fit into a

482
00:30:55,680 --> 00:30:59,160
Speaker 2: male dominated field. As the series went on, though her

483
00:30:59,160 --> 00:31:03,200
Speaker 2: clothing choices leaned more traditionally feminine. She would go on

484
00:31:03,280 --> 00:31:06,920
Speaker 2: to inspire the Scully Effect, the name for the perceived

485
00:31:07,000 --> 00:31:09,840
Speaker 2: impact this character had in terms of girls and women

486
00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:16,000
Speaker 2: pursuing careers in stem Also fan fiction alert, The X

487
00:31:16,040 --> 00:31:19,680
Speaker 2: Files had one of the first large online fan fiction communities,

488
00:31:19,840 --> 00:31:23,680
Speaker 2: to the extent that at one point, Scotland Yard decided

489
00:31:23,720 --> 00:31:26,800
Speaker 2: to investigate it, worring it might lead to a Heaven's

490
00:31:26,840 --> 00:31:35,280
Speaker 2: Gate type situation. Women and fashion. Throughout history, women's fashion

491
00:31:35,440 --> 00:31:40,000
Speaker 2: has rarely had to do with comfort or practicality. Instead,

492
00:31:40,120 --> 00:31:44,040
Speaker 2: it has often been about one hiding feminine bodies and

493
00:31:44,040 --> 00:31:48,920
Speaker 2: teaching shame, two showcasing feminine features for the male gaze,

494
00:31:49,640 --> 00:31:55,640
Speaker 2: three marketing to sell women more stuff. For instance, women

495
00:31:55,760 --> 00:31:59,320
Speaker 2: started wearing bras and shaving because of popular fashion trends,

496
00:31:59,640 --> 00:32:03,560
Speaker 2: prime when thin silks came into style in the nineteen twenties.

497
00:32:04,600 --> 00:32:07,400
Speaker 2: Don't even get me started on the uproar the short

498
00:32:07,440 --> 00:32:10,800
Speaker 2: bob hairstyle caused in the United States during this decade.

499
00:32:12,000 --> 00:32:15,320
Speaker 2: Not only that, but history is riddled with examples of

500
00:32:15,360 --> 00:32:20,800
Speaker 2: women's fashion that were outright dangerous. Makeup and fabrics made

501
00:32:20,840 --> 00:32:25,040
Speaker 2: with arsenic, deadly night shade, eye drops, harmful skin ut,

502
00:32:25,120 --> 00:32:28,920
Speaker 2: lightning treatments, hoop skirts that got caught in the wind

503
00:32:29,080 --> 00:32:34,040
Speaker 2: or lit on fire. Oscar Wilde's two half sisters died

504
00:32:34,480 --> 00:32:37,920
Speaker 2: when their skirts caught on fire. This is not a joke.

505
00:32:38,760 --> 00:32:43,240
Speaker 2: There were hobble skirts, skirts so narrow women couldn't take

506
00:32:43,280 --> 00:32:47,960
Speaker 2: a full stride, which were designed to literally slow women down.

507
00:32:49,040 --> 00:32:53,440
Speaker 2: There were unwieldy weighted sports uniforms. At one point, women

508
00:32:53,560 --> 00:33:00,240
Speaker 2: wore weighted bathing suits. Weighted bathing suits. Okay, they were

509
00:33:00,320 --> 00:33:03,000
Speaker 2: lightly weighted so the heavy skirts went and float, but

510
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:07,440
Speaker 2: still it sounds like a murder weapon, doesn't it. These

511
00:33:07,600 --> 00:33:11,120
Speaker 2: fashion woes still hound us to this day. Within the

512
00:33:11,160 --> 00:33:14,000
Speaker 2: past few years, a discussion of why clothes marketed to

513
00:33:14,080 --> 00:33:17,400
Speaker 2: girls and women tend not to have real pockets went viral.

514
00:33:18,480 --> 00:33:22,680
Speaker 2: God knows, I always want more pockets, and as we

515
00:33:22,720 --> 00:33:25,959
Speaker 2: saw in the previous chapter, women athletes are still fighting

516
00:33:26,000 --> 00:33:30,160
Speaker 2: for less sexualized uniforms. Women are still judged more harshly

517
00:33:30,240 --> 00:33:33,040
Speaker 2: for what they wear, what their tattoos look like, what

518
00:33:33,120 --> 00:33:37,480
Speaker 2: hairstyles they choose. The list is endless. We've come a

519
00:33:37,520 --> 00:33:40,000
Speaker 2: long way, but men still seem to think they're in

520
00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:48,080
Speaker 2: charge of policing how we look. Fictional women presents the

521
00:33:48,200 --> 00:33:53,480
Speaker 2: avatar name Ellie Williams from the Last of US video

522
00:33:53,560 --> 00:33:58,240
Speaker 2: game series Bio. Grew up in the Boston quarantine Zone,

523
00:33:58,560 --> 00:34:01,360
Speaker 2: lost her parents at a young age to the zombie Apocalypse,

524
00:34:01,800 --> 00:34:04,640
Speaker 2: bitten by a zombie at fourteen while on an outing

525
00:34:04,720 --> 00:34:07,680
Speaker 2: to the mall with her first crush, Riley, who was

526
00:34:07,720 --> 00:34:12,480
Speaker 2: also bitten. Turns out Ellie is immune. Travels across to

527
00:34:12,480 --> 00:34:15,879
Speaker 2: stopic United States with Joel, who becomes her surrogate father.

528
00:34:16,680 --> 00:34:23,400
Speaker 2: She is smart, queer, competent, sarcastic, funny, loyal, and absolutely terrifying,

529
00:34:24,320 --> 00:34:28,520
Speaker 2: has a chance at happiness, and chooses revenge open to forgiveness.

530
00:34:29,840 --> 00:34:37,279
Speaker 2: Relevant quote I'm just a girl, not a threat. The

531
00:34:37,320 --> 00:34:43,000
Speaker 2: bigger picture, more women play video games than men. Let

532
00:34:43,040 --> 00:34:47,399
Speaker 2: me repeat myself, More women play video games than men,

533
00:34:48,280 --> 00:34:51,120
Speaker 2: and yet the narrative around it would have you believe

534
00:34:51,200 --> 00:34:54,759
Speaker 2: that only men play games, that women don't care about

535
00:34:54,840 --> 00:35:00,799
Speaker 2: video games. Therefore games are geared mainly toward men, and

536
00:35:00,920 --> 00:35:03,520
Speaker 2: if women don't really play them anyway, the argument goes,

537
00:35:03,960 --> 00:35:06,600
Speaker 2: what does it matter if the world of gaming is toxic?

538
00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:10,600
Speaker 2: Who cares if the few women characters exist mostly for

539
00:35:10,640 --> 00:35:13,799
Speaker 2: the male gaze and for the male playable character's conquest

540
00:35:14,120 --> 00:35:17,840
Speaker 2: and storyline. A playable character, also known as a player

541
00:35:17,920 --> 00:35:21,279
Speaker 2: character or PC, is a fictional character in gaming whose

542
00:35:21,320 --> 00:35:25,840
Speaker 2: actions the real life player controls. Why shouldn't the female

543
00:35:25,920 --> 00:35:29,239
Speaker 2: character usually be skimply dressed or nude? Don't even get

544
00:35:29,280 --> 00:35:34,000
Speaker 2: me started on the games that glorify rape. In over

545
00:35:34,080 --> 00:35:37,120
Speaker 2: seventy five percent of games with only one protagonist, that

546
00:35:37,239 --> 00:35:41,480
Speaker 2: protagonist is male. Some male video game developers have even

547
00:35:41,560 --> 00:35:46,480
Speaker 2: stated out loud that female characters are too hard to

548
00:35:46,680 --> 00:35:52,480
Speaker 2: animate neutral face emoji. This analysis will, of course, have

549
00:35:52,520 --> 00:35:56,600
Speaker 2: its detractors. Often the statistics differ depending on what counts

550
00:35:56,640 --> 00:35:59,440
Speaker 2: as a video game, which is a point of contention

551
00:35:59,600 --> 00:36:03,760
Speaker 2: and frankly, often pretty sexist if you include phone games,

552
00:36:03,800 --> 00:36:09,240
Speaker 2: which are seen as lesser slash, less serious, women play more. Also,

553
00:36:09,520 --> 00:36:12,520
Speaker 2: men are more likely to call themselfs gamers, though women

554
00:36:12,560 --> 00:36:15,080
Speaker 2: are playing just as much, according to findings from the

555
00:36:15,080 --> 00:36:18,920
Speaker 2: Pew Research Center. In twenty eighteen, a report came out

556
00:36:18,960 --> 00:36:22,080
Speaker 2: that made headlines that women had surpassed men and console

557
00:36:22,120 --> 00:36:26,000
Speaker 2: gaming as well. Video games got caught up in the

558
00:36:26,040 --> 00:36:28,560
Speaker 2: gendering of toys that occurred in the eighties and nineties,

559
00:36:28,800 --> 00:36:32,759
Speaker 2: and they were at the time labeled for boys. Early

560
00:36:32,880 --> 00:36:36,120
Speaker 2: video gamesellers targeted boys because they wanted boys rather than

561
00:36:36,200 --> 00:36:39,600
Speaker 2: girls as their consumers. The same can be said for

562
00:36:39,680 --> 00:36:43,480
Speaker 2: action figures and board games, which historically have been highly gendered.

563
00:36:44,960 --> 00:36:49,160
Speaker 2: The amount of gatekeeping around video games is downright of setting.

564
00:36:49,960 --> 00:36:53,640
Speaker 2: The Women's Media Center's Speech Project found that users with

565
00:36:53,680 --> 00:36:57,319
Speaker 2: female user names were twenty five times more likely to

566
00:36:57,360 --> 00:37:00,200
Speaker 2: be threatened or harassed compared to users with male are

567
00:37:00,200 --> 00:37:04,839
Speaker 2: gender neutral usernames, and female video game journalists are two

568
00:37:04,920 --> 00:37:09,040
Speaker 2: thirds more likely to be harassed. Perhaps the most famous

569
00:37:09,040 --> 00:37:12,960
Speaker 2: example is that of Gamergate, when journalist Anita Sarkisian received

570
00:37:13,000 --> 00:37:16,600
Speaker 2: sexual assault and death threats for daring to discuss sexist

571
00:37:16,640 --> 00:37:20,040
Speaker 2: tropes in games. Several of her talks have had to

572
00:37:20,120 --> 00:37:23,920
Speaker 2: be canceled due to bomb threats. She was sent violent

573
00:37:23,960 --> 00:37:26,919
Speaker 2: images of herself being murdered or raped by video game

574
00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:31,600
Speaker 2: characters death threats. Tell me again about freedom of speech?

575
00:37:32,080 --> 00:37:36,799
Speaker 2: Who is being silenced here? Women make video games too,

576
00:37:36,920 --> 00:37:41,040
Speaker 2: despite outrageous obstacles in their way. However, the number of

577
00:37:41,120 --> 00:37:43,880
Speaker 2: women in the gaming industry is pretty abysmal and the

578
00:37:43,880 --> 00:37:47,839
Speaker 2: attrition rate is high. Numerous women have spoken out about

579
00:37:47,840 --> 00:37:51,680
Speaker 2: the truly misogynistic and toxic work environments that drove them away.

580
00:37:52,840 --> 00:37:55,360
Speaker 2: As of this recording, one of the biggest gaming companies,

581
00:37:55,440 --> 00:37:59,160
Speaker 2: Activision Blizzard, is under fire after the California Department of

582
00:37:59,200 --> 00:38:03,000
Speaker 2: Fair Employment and Housing filed a lawsuit in twenty twenty one.

583
00:38:03,040 --> 00:38:06,480
Speaker 2: The details have been truly horrific, painting a picture of

584
00:38:06,520 --> 00:38:09,680
Speaker 2: a workplace that was disturbingly hostile to women and other

585
00:38:09,800 --> 00:38:18,239
Speaker 2: marginalized employees. Stories of sexual assault, misogyny, racism, and homophobia abound.

586
00:38:18,400 --> 00:38:22,279
Speaker 2: This behavior prevented women from attending work functions and from

587
00:38:22,280 --> 00:38:25,800
Speaker 2: being promoted, and often led them to leave the company,

588
00:38:26,120 --> 00:38:30,440
Speaker 2: if not the industry altogether. This has created a vicious

589
00:38:30,440 --> 00:38:33,320
Speaker 2: cycle where our games are made under the status quo,

590
00:38:33,400 --> 00:38:36,359
Speaker 2: with women characters as sex objects and women and girl

591
00:38:36,400 --> 00:38:41,720
Speaker 2: players not prioritized. The potential for so many great games

592
00:38:41,760 --> 00:38:44,480
Speaker 2: has been lost due to this lack of diversity in

593
00:38:44,480 --> 00:38:47,960
Speaker 2: the field. It may not seem like it based on

594
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:51,600
Speaker 2: popular news coverage, but video games can have a positive

595
00:38:51,640 --> 00:38:55,880
Speaker 2: impact on things like brain development, coordination, empathy, and conditions

596
00:38:55,880 --> 00:38:59,080
Speaker 2: like PTSD. Of course, that is highly dependent on which

597
00:38:59,120 --> 00:39:03,720
Speaker 2: game is being played. Gaming can be fun, rewarding, moving,

598
00:39:03,880 --> 00:39:07,560
Speaker 2: and in some cases, almost life changing. Video games are

599
00:39:07,640 --> 00:39:11,440
Speaker 2: a big business, and they are not going away, And

600
00:39:11,480 --> 00:39:14,480
Speaker 2: we're telling women and girls they don't belong, that they

601
00:39:14,520 --> 00:39:18,279
Speaker 2: shouldn't be making them. Hell, they shouldn't even be playing them.

602
00:39:18,480 --> 00:39:20,759
Speaker 2: And if they do, it's only as long as they

603
00:39:20,800 --> 00:39:25,400
Speaker 2: obey the rules, don't complain, stay in their sexualized lane,

604
00:39:25,800 --> 00:39:27,839
Speaker 2: as though it's only by the grace of the male

605
00:39:27,920 --> 00:39:32,560
Speaker 2: gatekeepers they are even allowed in the space. Then the

606
00:39:32,680 --> 00:39:35,080
Speaker 2: second we raise our hand to point out a problem

607
00:39:35,160 --> 00:39:38,479
Speaker 2: with the status quo, we are threatened until we leave.

608
00:39:39,680 --> 00:39:43,120
Speaker 2: But we're missing out on so much if we don't

609
00:39:43,160 --> 00:39:46,000
Speaker 2: work to change the space to make it less toxic

610
00:39:46,520 --> 00:39:52,080
Speaker 2: than it's game over, gamer game over? Why she matters

611
00:39:52,120 --> 00:39:57,239
Speaker 2: to me? I've always loved video games. I think they

612
00:39:57,239 --> 00:40:00,600
Speaker 2: can be beautiful spaces for storytelling. When the play connects

613
00:40:00,640 --> 00:40:02,800
Speaker 2: to the playable character in a way that is different

614
00:40:02,880 --> 00:40:07,080
Speaker 2: from other media. I've played games that have absolutely devastated me,

615
00:40:07,400 --> 00:40:10,719
Speaker 2: and I've played games that have moved me. To not

616
00:40:10,840 --> 00:40:12,879
Speaker 2: have a female character in the space that I love,

617
00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:17,759
Speaker 2: or one that is not sexualized, is equally devastating. Years ago,

618
00:40:17,880 --> 00:40:21,280
Speaker 2: I actually stopped playing online games because of the harassment

619
00:40:21,320 --> 00:40:24,920
Speaker 2: I received. I was twelve at the time. I had

620
00:40:24,920 --> 00:40:27,640
Speaker 2: a gender neutral avatar and name, but I guess it

621
00:40:27,719 --> 00:40:31,319
Speaker 2: wasn't enough. It's strange that as a twelve year old

622
00:40:31,680 --> 00:40:35,920
Speaker 2: I was receiving countless sexual overtures and threats, yet somehow

623
00:40:35,960 --> 00:40:41,480
Speaker 2: I just thought, yeah, that goes with the territory. Eventually, though,

624
00:40:41,560 --> 00:40:43,839
Speaker 2: I decided I couldn't hack it, so I had to leave.

625
00:40:44,600 --> 00:40:49,000
Speaker 2: In my mind, the problem was with me. I kept playing,

626
00:40:49,200 --> 00:40:51,880
Speaker 2: just not online. A part of me still felt I

627
00:40:51,960 --> 00:40:54,719
Speaker 2: was weird, that I was somehow trespassing into a world

628
00:40:54,760 --> 00:40:57,040
Speaker 2: where I was not welcome, and that I was either

629
00:40:57,080 --> 00:40:59,759
Speaker 2: going to be forced out or hit on because of it.

630
00:41:00,360 --> 00:41:04,520
Speaker 2: So I mostly kept my gaming a secret. I was good,

631
00:41:04,840 --> 00:41:07,680
Speaker 2: not as good as my brothers, I told myself. I

632
00:41:07,719 --> 00:41:12,399
Speaker 2: couldn't possibly be, I thought, but I was good. Once

633
00:41:12,440 --> 00:41:15,200
Speaker 2: in college, I won a super Smash Brothers melee tournament.

634
00:41:16,040 --> 00:41:18,799
Speaker 2: I went to a technical school whose population was over

635
00:41:18,880 --> 00:41:22,239
Speaker 2: seventy percent men, so, as you can imagine, this was

636
00:41:22,280 --> 00:41:27,880
Speaker 2: a big deal. Almost immediately, all the other competitors, all men,

637
00:41:28,320 --> 00:41:31,680
Speaker 2: ganged up on me, started shouting at me, complaining that

638
00:41:31,719 --> 00:41:35,759
Speaker 2: I cheated, that I was a lying bitch. I never

639
00:41:36,040 --> 00:41:40,840
Speaker 2: competed again. Most of my favorite games involved complex or

640
00:41:40,880 --> 00:41:45,480
Speaker 2: interesting female characters, usually playable. May I list some of

641
00:41:45,520 --> 00:41:50,640
Speaker 2: my favorites was that a resounding yes, Tara and Celis

642
00:41:50,719 --> 00:41:54,920
Speaker 2: from Final Fantasy three, Slash six, Tifa and Aireth from

643
00:41:54,960 --> 00:41:59,560
Speaker 2: Final Fantasy seven, Yuna, Riku and Lulu from Final Fantasy Tien,

644
00:42:00,080 --> 00:42:04,560
Speaker 2: Clara Redfield from a Resident Evil, Elizabeth from BioShock Infinite,

645
00:42:04,840 --> 00:42:09,719
Speaker 2: Maya from Parisite Eve, Alex from Oxen Free Fimship from

646
00:42:09,760 --> 00:42:13,640
Speaker 2: Mass Effects, and of course that brings us to one

647
00:42:13,680 --> 00:42:16,680
Speaker 2: of my favorite game series of all time, The Last

648
00:42:16,680 --> 00:42:23,440
Speaker 2: of Us. Marlene, Dina, Yara, lev Riley, Abby and Ellie.

649
00:42:24,880 --> 00:42:27,200
Speaker 2: I remember the first time I played the Last of Us.

650
00:42:27,840 --> 00:42:31,799
Speaker 2: When I was introduced to the foul mouth, lethal, traumatized

651
00:42:31,840 --> 00:42:34,800
Speaker 2: and funny fourteen year old Ellie. I felt the strangest

652
00:42:34,840 --> 00:42:38,680
Speaker 2: sense of relief and bubbling happiness. This game is not

653
00:42:38,880 --> 00:42:42,200
Speaker 2: happy by any stretch of the imagination, but I was

654
00:42:42,200 --> 00:42:45,239
Speaker 2: happy to play it, and to play her. There were

655
00:42:45,239 --> 00:42:48,120
Speaker 2: still plenty of tropes, including that of a young girl

656
00:42:48,200 --> 00:42:51,319
Speaker 2: being the ultimate innocent to drive the violent actions of

657
00:42:51,320 --> 00:42:54,759
Speaker 2: the main male character. Again, find me over drinks and

658
00:42:54,800 --> 00:42:57,799
Speaker 2: I will discuss them at length. That I adored her.

659
00:42:59,120 --> 00:43:02,560
Speaker 2: Then spoiler alert, You might want to skip these next

660
00:43:02,600 --> 00:43:04,839
Speaker 2: few paragraphs if you don't want to get hints about

661
00:43:04,880 --> 00:43:07,560
Speaker 2: what happens in the Last of Us, part two. The

662
00:43:07,600 --> 00:43:10,960
Speaker 2: second one came out, and she wasn't the same girl

663
00:43:11,320 --> 00:43:15,760
Speaker 2: she'd grown up. She was more cynical. I loved her still,

664
00:43:15,920 --> 00:43:20,400
Speaker 2: even though it hurt to see to play the vengeance

665
00:43:20,440 --> 00:43:26,120
Speaker 2: obsessed woman she'd become. But seeing her playing her you connect.

666
00:43:26,680 --> 00:43:30,279
Speaker 2: You pour some of yourself into her. You beg her

667
00:43:30,680 --> 00:43:34,520
Speaker 2: to make different choices. Even though you can't control the

668
00:43:34,560 --> 00:43:37,040
Speaker 2: plot like you can to some extent in other games,

669
00:43:37,400 --> 00:43:39,960
Speaker 2: you control the character and play your part in it,

670
00:43:40,280 --> 00:43:44,200
Speaker 2: so it feels like a commentary on you. At least,

671
00:43:44,320 --> 00:43:48,359
Speaker 2: that's what good games can do, and the commentary sought

672
00:43:48,360 --> 00:43:51,239
Speaker 2: to make you question what you yourself have done and

673
00:43:51,280 --> 00:43:56,719
Speaker 2: glorified as a gamer. The violence the nameless deaths. It

674
00:43:56,800 --> 00:43:59,560
Speaker 2: made you question gaming, what it is and what it

675
00:43:59,560 --> 00:44:03,520
Speaker 2: could be, and your part in the whole thing. A

676
00:44:03,560 --> 00:44:08,120
Speaker 2: lot of people, a lot of them dudes, hated it.

677
00:44:08,120 --> 00:44:10,600
Speaker 2: It's fine not to like something or to be sad

678
00:44:10,600 --> 00:44:13,520
Speaker 2: about how it played out, to have criticisms, but a

679
00:44:13,560 --> 00:44:17,720
Speaker 2: lot of this backlash wasn't that. After the new version

680
00:44:17,760 --> 00:44:21,200
Speaker 2: came out, countless death threats were made to the creators,

681
00:44:21,440 --> 00:44:25,360
Speaker 2: to the voice actors. The male gamers didn't like these questions.

682
00:44:25,880 --> 00:44:28,839
Speaker 2: They didn't like being asked to be empathetic, to think

683
00:44:28,880 --> 00:44:32,120
Speaker 2: about gaming and what's wrong with it. They didn't appreciate

684
00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:35,040
Speaker 2: playing a woman's violent revenge story, though they had never

685
00:44:35,200 --> 00:44:39,200
Speaker 2: had any qualms about playing a man's. They felt entitled

686
00:44:39,239 --> 00:44:42,560
Speaker 2: to a certain type of game, one that didn't put

687
00:44:42,600 --> 00:44:46,200
Speaker 2: stories about women, queer folks, people of color at the center.

688
00:44:46,960 --> 00:44:50,840
Speaker 2: But I loved it. I connected to the tale of loss,

689
00:44:50,880 --> 00:44:54,360
Speaker 2: of choosing vengeance over happiness and the fallout leading to

690
00:44:54,400 --> 00:44:59,840
Speaker 2: the realization of Ellie's ultimate fear being alone. As so

691
00:45:00,000 --> 00:45:02,239
Speaker 2: someone who recently lost someone close to me after our

692
00:45:02,320 --> 00:45:06,839
Speaker 2: relationship became strained and damaged, who wanted to forgive but

693
00:45:06,920 --> 00:45:11,920
Speaker 2: couldn't until they were gone. It hit hard, made me cry,

694
00:45:12,239 --> 00:45:15,360
Speaker 2: like you wouldn't believe unless you're a friend of mine,

695
00:45:15,440 --> 00:45:18,960
Speaker 2: then you would believe it. It's time we asked some

696
00:45:19,080 --> 00:45:22,000
Speaker 2: more questions about gaming, about why we've allowed it to

697
00:45:22,040 --> 00:45:25,080
Speaker 2: be so toxic for so long, and what we can

698
00:45:25,120 --> 00:45:27,560
Speaker 2: do about it, because we have a lot of work

699
00:45:27,600 --> 00:45:30,680
Speaker 2: to do. While we are seeing more games with diverse

700
00:45:30,800 --> 00:45:35,359
Speaker 2: characters made by more diverse creators, the backlash is still horrifying,

701
00:45:36,200 --> 00:45:39,680
Speaker 2: in part because of that these numbers have actually decreased

702
00:45:39,920 --> 00:45:44,520
Speaker 2: in recent years. We are going the wrong direction. Maybe

703
00:45:44,560 --> 00:45:47,080
Speaker 2: if more women join me online and demand a better

704
00:45:47,160 --> 00:45:49,759
Speaker 2: world when they get there, we can get things moving

705
00:45:49,800 --> 00:46:05,080
Speaker 2: in the right direction once and for all. And that

706
00:46:05,120 --> 00:46:07,840
Speaker 2: brings us to the end of this bonus episode. We

707
00:46:07,960 --> 00:46:11,359
Speaker 2: hope that you enjoyed it, and you enjoyed all of

708
00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:14,880
Speaker 2: the narration, the sound effects, and also all of the

709
00:46:14,960 --> 00:46:19,160
Speaker 2: hard work it came to making this come alive in

710
00:46:19,320 --> 00:46:23,640
Speaker 2: audio form, because even though we're in podcasting, I've realized

711
00:46:24,680 --> 00:46:27,439
Speaker 2: trying to explain our podcast is difficult because we talk

712
00:46:27,520 --> 00:46:32,120
Speaker 2: about everything, and we also do it very as this

713
00:46:32,160 --> 00:46:36,399
Speaker 2: book shows you, Like Hi, I have an interjection which

714
00:46:36,440 --> 00:46:39,520
Speaker 2: is sort of hard to translate. In some ways in

715
00:46:39,600 --> 00:46:43,359
Speaker 2: an audio book format. Yeah, but I think that they

716
00:46:43,360 --> 00:46:46,160
Speaker 2: did an amazing job and I hope that you really

717
00:46:46,239 --> 00:46:50,080
Speaker 2: enjoyed it, and I hope that you will check it

718
00:46:50,120 --> 00:46:55,880
Speaker 2: out because the published date is coming August twenty ninth,

719
00:46:56,040 --> 00:46:59,120
Speaker 2: twenty twenty three, and you can you can pre order

720
00:46:59,160 --> 00:47:01,480
Speaker 2: now at stuffy should read books dot com either the

721
00:47:01,520 --> 00:47:05,840
Speaker 2: physical book or the audiobook, or Boo will tell you

722
00:47:05,880 --> 00:47:10,440
Speaker 2: what to do. We would really really appreciate it. Thanks

723
00:47:10,480 --> 00:47:13,600
Speaker 2: so much for listening. You can find us on Twitter

724
00:47:13,760 --> 00:47:17,000
Speaker 2: at mom stuff Podcasts, or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff.

725
00:47:17,000 --> 00:47:19,080
Speaker 2: I never told you. We do have a tea public

726
00:47:19,120 --> 00:47:22,279
Speaker 2: store if you want some merch and yes, you can

727
00:47:22,320 --> 00:47:25,719
Speaker 2: pre order the book audiobook at stuff you should read

728
00:47:25,719 --> 00:47:30,160
Speaker 2: books dot com. Thanks as always to our super producer Christina,

729
00:47:30,200 --> 00:47:32,600
Speaker 2: our executive producer Maya, and our contributor Joey.

730
00:47:32,880 --> 00:47:35,680
Speaker 1: They really were a huge part of this book that

731
00:47:35,719 --> 00:47:37,880
Speaker 1: we don't talk enough about, especially the things that has

732
00:47:37,920 --> 00:47:41,640
Speaker 1: been thrown at them at the very last minute. We're sorrying, thank.

733
00:47:41,480 --> 00:47:44,120
Speaker 2: You, yes, we're sorry, and thank you, and thank you

734
00:47:44,160 --> 00:47:47,800
Speaker 2: to the whole team, the audiobook team who you all

735
00:47:47,880 --> 00:47:51,600
Speaker 2: were amazing. Thank you. I'm late yes, and thanks to

736
00:47:51,680 --> 00:47:55,239
Speaker 2: you listeners for listening stuff I Never told you this

737
00:47:55,280 --> 00:47:57,719
Speaker 2: podcast from iHeartRadio. For more podcast from my heart Radio,

738
00:47:57,760 --> 00:47:59,640
Speaker 2: you can check out the heart radio app, Apple podcast,

739
00:47:59,760 --> 00:48:01,280
Speaker 2: or you listen to your favorite shows