Five Women
▻https://www.thisamericanlife.org/640/five-women
A different kind of #MeToo story, about several women who worked for the same man. They tell us not only about their troubling encounters with him, but also about their lives beforehand. Who were they when they entered the workplace, and how did their personal histories shape the way they dealt with his harassment?
Chana Joffe-Walt, the author, was interviewed on the longform podcast last week: ▻https://longform.org/posts/longform-podcast-285-chana-joffe-walt
I felt like there was more to learn from these stories, more than just which men are bad and shouldn’t have the Netflix special that they wanted to have. And I was interested, also, in that there were groups of women, and that somehow, in having a group of women, you would have variation of experience. There could be a unifying person who they all experienced, but they would inevitably experience that person differently. And that would raise the question of: Why? And I feel like there is this response: ‘Why did she stay?’ Or: ‘Why didn’t she say fuck you?’ Or: ‘I wouldn’t have been upset by that. I wouldn’t have been offended by that thing.’ Which I feel like is a natural response, but also has a lack of curiosity. There are actual answers to those questions that are interesting.
Liliana Segura, another former alternet reporter was recently on longform and talked about her time there as well:
▻https://longform.org/posts/longform-podcast-280-liliana-segura