A weekly look at the women and women’s stuff we love…
You might think, when reading the Vagenda, that we have a hell of a lot of beef with a hell of a lot of women. We don’t. We have feministic steak tartare type beef with SOME women in the media, which doesn’t necessarily mean that we think they are bad people and that we wouldn’t sit down with them for a Pimm’s and a chat (about how everything they write is wrong). But prhaps it’s time for some LADY POSITIVITY too- for us to celebrate the women we DO love and point you in their direction. Hence, chart of SUSSED.
Book of the Week- Living Dolls, by Natasha Walters. It is VAIR VAIR good look at the return of sexism and, if you haven’t read it already, YOU MUST. It’s clever and accessible and has loads of opinions which you can gobble up and regurgitate as your own to look switched on when you’re in the pub with your friends.
Hack of the Week- Rosamund Urwin, the Evening Standard. For her excellent commentary on Lucy Worsely, (choice quote: “Somehow, the possible future habitation of a woman’s womb is deemed an acceptable topic of conversation in a way that what a man plans to do with his sperm isn’t.”) and her rebuttal of the nasty twitterer who said she was too ugly to be a stripper. Read it here.
Website of the Week- Awesome Women of Twitter. Clever, witty, intelligent writing from women who found each other through twitter. They have a shared love of gin and cake and yes, they are awesome. Go here.
TV Show of the Week- Girls We’re still swimming upstream on this one. Yes, we know you don’t have HBO, and yes, we know it is overwhelmingly caucasian and does not truly reflect the diversity of New York City. But IT’S FUCKING FUNNY. It’s really, really FUCKING FUNNY. And it talks about girl stuff, in a way that most shitty American TV shows don’t. And if you’re concerned about the whole ‘not being in America’ thing, then there’s this wonderful little thing called ‘watching stuff illegally on t’internet’ that we are in no way recommending that you do. Just, ahem, making you aware of it.
Vagenda Ladybro KUDOS OF THE WEEK- Emer This is the self-referential us giving ourselves a pat on the back category. The response to Emer’s post on body hair was overwhelmingly positive, pushed us well over the million hits (with no small thanks to Caitlin Moran, another woman we love) and did muchos work towards getting people thinking ‘yeah, maybe ripping hairs out of my vag with a machine which gives me lots of tiny electric shocks isn’t so much of a hoot after all.’ Muchos kudos.
‘Beauty’ product of the week- Boots Cucumber Eye Gel, £1.52. It won’t make you more beautiful. But if you’re a cryer, like I am, it with soothe those swollen mouse eye peepers you got while watching that Louis Theroux documentary on dementia faster than you can say “waaaaah.”
Drink of the week- Old Fashioned Yep, it’s a man drink, for MEN. Don Draper told you that. But if you sweetly ask your boyfriend or dad or favourite bartender to make you one while you sit pretty crossing keening like a helpless kitten, you’ll discover that they are surprisingly tasty. Three, and you’ll be doing a comedy striptease to Sinatra’s ‘Fly Me To The Moon’ in the kitchen while your boyfriend does the Macarena in the corner in his boxers (actually happened.)
Women’s Magazine of the Week- Stylist. Still is, and probably always will be, unless the others pull their cashmere socks up. This week, Stylist did a webchat with Indeopendent Mayoral Candidate Siobhan Benita, who has largely been ignored by the mainstream press. They also openly acknowledge the fact that women read books, and not ones that are just about moving to London to work in PR and falling in love with the guy in the graphic design department, before leaving to start your own cupcake business.
HOW DID YOU KNOW ABOUT THE GUY IN THE GRAPHIC DESIGN DEPARTMENT?