There was a time when I thought that greeting myself in the mirror and saying, "Hey, girl. I love you," was my middle-aged right. It felt good, writes @deniseschipani.bsky.social. But it doesn’t anymore.
Five years since Sarah Everard was kidnapped, raped, then murdered. She was wearing an anorak, and walking along a well-lit route: the things we're meant to do to stay safe. But her parents couldn't see her face to say goodbye, because her killer had set fire to her body.
How much has changed?
"Identity enmeshment" is the idea that you are your job and your job is you. You can disentangle your identity from your job in small, steady steps.
In the four years since Russia invaded Ukraine, 14,000 women and girls have been injured. Now, the UN is warning that with funding for women's organizations running out, women and girls face a "triple threat".
An interesting look at the history of name changing customs & laws and the "battle over women’s surnames," from @kathleenedavis.bsky.social in @thepersistent.bsky.social:
"The tradition of a woman changing her last name from her father’s to her husband’s is part of an English law called coverture."
In my latest for @thepersistent.bsky.social, I argue that the French government's decision to write to 29-year-olds to "combat" infertility misses the point, because the decision to have a child isn't just a medical issue, it's a social one, too. www.thepersistent.com/france-ferti...
"’These delays can compound over time to affect [women’s] career trajectories,’ Cassidy Sugimoto, an info scientist at the GA Inst of Tech who was not involved in the study, told ‘The Scientist’ in an interview about the findings.
‘When production slows [...] visibility slows with it,’ she added.”🧪
After 20-odd years of hiding my deep hatred of Cathy and her stupid boyfriend, writing this felt good.
On the first day of Trump's second term, he ordered that transgender, nonbinary, and intersex identities would no longer be recognized by the federal government. That has made it much harder to track the well-being, needs, and disparities affecting LGBT communities, writes @josiecox.bsky.social.
Wuthering Heights is a dull book about cold, bored people finding new ways to torture each other, writes @emmahaslett.bsky.social. At least Emerald Fennell's movie realizes how camp it is.
When a woman academic is the lead author, the peer review process takes almost 15% longer, writes @josiecox.bsky.social.
The French government's decision to write to 29 year-olds to warn them about their fertility misses the point, writes @diane2v.bsky.social. The decision to have a child isn't just a medical issue, it's a social one, too.
“Move fast and break things” has long been a battle cry for the testosterone-fueled world of tech startups, writes @josiecox.bsky.social. Now, research suggests that one of the things that breaks when startups move too fast, is a commitment to gender diversity.
'I was happy my identity wasn’t based on good looks, but rather, on a sense of humor and smarts,' writes Laura Fraser. 'Deep down, though, I wanted to be pretty.'
Lindsey Vonn proved this weekend that she wasn’t going to live by shoulds or coulds, writes @josiecox.bsky.social.
Her story is about the deeply personal calculus of knowing your limits and your tolerances; it’s about the radical act of deciding for yourself what you want and what you can risk.
Some 42% of women feel worse off today than they did a year ago, and 57% say it's harder to raise a child now than it was this time last year. Some 43% of women - and well over half of Black women - say they have lost rights under Trump.
An estimated 69m women in the U.S. have changed their last name. Under the SAVE Act, that could very well mean they can't vote.
In India, "shame-laden" Victorian laws made it virtually impossible to buy sex toys. But one enterprising influencer spotted the potential of online shopping.
The Oscar-nominated short film Jane Austen's Period Drama is a period drama about actual periods. It does feel revolutionary, and it does feel brave, writes Gabriella Griffith. But should it?
www.thepersistent.com/jane-austens...
Gisèle Pelicot's son, David, has teamed up with UN Women France (ONU Femmes France) to underscore a critical point: 92% of sexual violence against women in France is perpetrated by men. Women cannot put an end to rape on their own.
www.thepersistent.com/david-pelico...
When I complain about America’s politics, which I do frequently, people tell me I’m lucky because I “can just leave whenever I want,” writes @josiecox.bsky.social. But loving a place means facing the parts of it that disappoint and upset us.
www.thepersistent.com/what-it-mean...
Billionaire wealth hit a historic high in 2025, with male tech executives leading the way.
www.thepersistent.com/the-rich-kee...
The practice of a wife taking her husband's name after marriage stems from a long-extinct English law known as coverture, which made women the property of their fathers, then husbands.
So why do 80% of American women still take their husbands' last names?
www.thepersistent.com/feminism-cha...
As NYC nurses go on strike, a survey shows under-staffing and over-work has led nurses around the U.S. to feel overwhelmed and exhausted.
www.thepersistent.com/nurses-strik...
Whitney White says directing the Broadway play Liberation showed her that modern feminists are risking less than their 1970s forebears. "They weren't just liking things on Instagram."
www.thepersistent.com/broadway-lib...
What I Was Wearing, a cartoon by @aubreyhirsch.bsky.social.
101 years ago this week, America's first woman governor was elected. But Nellie Tayloe Ross had never had ambitions of political leadership. Instead, this opportunity arrived on the heels of grief.
www.thepersistent.com/who-was-nell...
Couple in here from me! Including:
- The story of Jane Goodall's sexist boss
- Why gentle parenting experts are just three misogynists in a raincoat
- What AI's obsession with beauty is doing to us
These are the best stories published by The Persistent in 2025, as picked by our editor @francescadonner.bsky.social.
www.thepersistent.com/favorite-sto...
