Don't Drink Poison

I’ve always been a fan of advice columns, ever since the days of Charlie Brown and Lucy’s “the doctor is in” days. It’s fascinating to see people’s often fucked-up views of proper behavior, and to compare paid columnists’ advice to my own. Unfortunately, I’ve found that this particular medium is rife with horrible assholery, particularly women giving horrible, sexist advice to or about other women.




Some time ago, I read some heinous advice in The Slate’s Dear Prudence column, and I wrote to the author to complain. Her ridiculous response inspired me at first to just stop reading her column, but then I had another idea—I would read it religiously every Thursday, and shit all over her sexist advice, and any other maddening arguments I happen to find in print or broadcast media.

The mission of this space and countless other feminist media criticism blogs is to illuminate what’s in front of you. So here's some advice for you.

Don’t drink the Kool-Aid without realizing it’s spiked with arsenic. Don’t read, watch and listen to poison without knowing what it’s saying.