Millenial Pinkwashing
3/9/18 - Shine Theory, millennial pinkwashing, and intellectual property in the internet age. Plus, women-only spaces for profit and for community.
Transcript below.
Listen on Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | Overcast | Pocket Casts | Spotify.
CREDITS
Producer: Gina Delvac
Hosts: Aminatou Sow & Ann Friedman
Theme song: Call Your Girlfriend by Robyn
Composer: Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs
Visual Creative Director: Kenesha Sneed
Merch Director: Caroline Knowles
Editorial Assistant: Laura Bertocci
Ad sales: Midroll
LINKS
Shine Theory / millennial pinkwashing
Jaclyn Friedman laying groundwork on consent
Audre Lorde laying groundwork on *everything*
NYC: The Wing and New Women Space
TRANSCRIPT: MILLENIAL PINKWASHING
[Ads]
(0:40)
Aminatou: Welcome to Call Your Girlfriend.
Ann: A podcast for long-distance besties everywhere.
Aminatou: I'm Aminatou Sow.
Ann: And I'm Ann Friedman. On this week's agenda Shine Theory, millennial pinkwashing, and intellectual property in the Internet age. Plus a discussion of women-only spaces for profit and for community.
[Theme Song]
Aminatou: Hello Ann Friedman.
Ann: Hey boo, hey. How you feeling? How's it going?
Aminatou: [Laughs] You know, still have cancer. Doing good. I'm doing great. I'm eating this delicious banana bread that my friend Alexis left at my doorstep yesterday and honestly wow, a good banana bread can really change your life.
(1:55)
Ann: The quick bread on the doorstep is a real calling card that I would like to bring into my own life.
Aminatou: Oh my god, Alexis Coe, historian, amazing baker, everything. The best.
Ann: Boom, boom, boom.
Aminatou: How's your day going over there?
Ann: Just great. I have nothing to complain about.
Aminatou: [Laughs]
Ann: You know there is something about your BFF having cancer where you're just like legit nothing's a problem ever for me.
Aminatou: Oh my gosh, that's not fair.
Ann: It's not fair and it's not true.
Aminatou: It's relative. It's all relative.
Ann: I'm just serious though. I'm just like I don't know, you know?
Aminatou: You're like my house is on fire but at least I don't have cancer. Thank god.
Ann: Okay, listen, if my house were on fire I would be wailing about that to you. Don't worry, there is a line.
Aminatou: Oh my gosh. I meant your spiritual house.
Ann: My spiritual . . . [Laughter] What's going on? We had some drama this week.
Aminatou: You know, we didn't have drama. Somebody else had drama with us this week.
Ann: Wow, wow.
Aminatou: I feel great. I was just minding my own business on Al Gore's Internet, perusing Instagram as I'm want to do, and somebody alerted me to the fact -- thank you to our vigilant listeners -- alerted us to the fact that something called Creative and Cultivate which is like a beautiful woman slogan/Instagram slogan machine . . .
Ann: Well I will read you from the about page: "Create and Cultivate is a movement for women looking to create and cultivate the career of their dreams."
Aminatou: Wow, okay. It's a movement. Okay. Okay.
Ann: I'm just reading you from the website. Not fact-checking that.
Aminatou: So this movement -- this Instagram women's movement -- was doing some sort of campaign on their own. They had partnered with Mary Kay which is a cosmetics brand if you don't know. Personally I think it's a pyramid scheme but I'm going to set that aside today.
Ann: It was a series of sponsored blog posts with Mary Kay money I believe.
Aminatou: Exactly, about Shine Theory. If you're new to this podcast Shine Theory are belong to us. [Laughs]
Ann: That's not true exactly.
(3:55)
Aminatou: I mean we -- it's true in the sense we own the trademark. You wrote the article about it. It's kind of a thing that we're known for.
[Clip Starts]
Aminatou: Ann and I's operating friendship principle is what we call Shine Theory. It's I don't shine if you don't shine. You know, the core kind of belief behind Shine Theory is investing in a core group of people the same way that you'd invest in yourself. There is no room for pettiness or jealousy. We're all part of the same team and we are all trying to kind of accomplish the same things. And it's so much more fun if you do it with people you love. Their successes are your successes.
[Clip Ends]
Aminatou: You know, in the grand scheme of things it's not a big deal but in the scheme of things of giving women credit for their work we'll claim it.
Ann: Well, and also in the scheme of things where I think this is something that you and I have opted thus far not to monetize in this particular way. I'm not opposed to people making money on their ideas, don't get me wrong, but the idea that this is something that -- a term that we coined that did not exist in the public lexicon before we came up with it and wrote about it, until now we have not used it to maybe, I don't know, do a partnership with a beauty product brand or a fitness brand that might be really excited about the idea. The weird thing about Shine Theory is I see it as a very collaborative, anti-capitalist, not a kind of corporate feminist how do you lone person get ahead but how can we take a work together approach to people having better lives and meeting their goals? Not just like their salary goals. To me all of that should be challenging to a capitalist status quo that says scarcity, scarcity, scarcity, work harder for it. Right?
But also if you only deal with the surface level of Shine Theory, women love other women, it makes the perfect corporate tie-in fodder. It's like a very weird thing going on with what Shine Theory is so I feel like that's worth noting as well.
(6:00)
Aminatou: Yeah, I agree with you absolutely. So yeah, let's break down the reasons this casually rubbed us the wrong way. I think there's just something, a baseline, like if we are on the Internet as creative people I don't care what the medium is. It's there's something really offensive about using somebody else's work, even if you think that just Internet shorthand is not a big deal, and claiming it as your own. I'm like there's something very exploitive about that. We all learned about plagiarism in school. And then there's something particularly egregious about making money off of some -- off of something that you didn't come up with yourself. I just don't understand in what world that's okay.
And then when you tie it all in with the bow of women helping women it becomes even more insidious. It's like are you kidding me? The whole point of women helping women is because people take advantage of women all the time so don't be a woman that takes advantage of women.
Ann: Yeah. And then there's also -- and I think you're right that there's something going on about the culture of the Internet and kind of Instagram sloganeering which says that it's totally -- like if anything is on Instagram it's in the public domain. Like I think of this woman, Katie Zhu, who did kind of a quick hand-drawn cartoon that I'm sure you've seen lately as we're all thinking about gun control more. And it says "Thoughts and prayers" with a line through it and it says "Policy and change" underneath.
Aminatou: Yes.
Ann: Which is a thing that she posted after one of many shootings. Wendy McNaughton who's also been on the podcast is a different illustrator who has created a similar kind of hand-drawn graphic and I see both of those all the time, like celebrities love to post them after a shooting without investigating who did it. And I think it can be, if you're not willing to put in a little bit of time, it can seem impossible to figure out who originated something. But I also think that the bar is a little different for some celebrity who is trying to express something. I mean yes, it'd obviously be better but it's very different when you are taking a concept and selling a full-sponsored campaign behind it or attempting to monetize it in a really direct way. So there's a lot of different ways to violate the basic respect of credit where credit is due in the Internet era.
(8:18)
Aminatou: Right. If you couldn't come up with it yourself you should probably investigate who else came up with it. But let's just focus on the monetized campaign here. I feel like if you're somebody who works on campaigns or you're working on an online branding opportunity with somebody else you would probably just do a really quick Google for something and then find out if it exists. I know that I do this all the time, especially if I'm selling a client work. I'm just like oh, where does this come from? What other context has it been used in? Etc., etc., etc. All that to say that that was violated and we made a stink about it.
Ann: Yeah, I was enraged. [Laughs] I feel like make a stink is like a low -- I'm like my blood pressure was high. [Laughs]
Aminatou: I was like medium enraged but mostly I was like ugh, I love this. Honestly the real reason that I love when people do this with Shine Theory is it completely belies that you don't understand what Shine Theory is. Like if you understood it you wouldn't do it, you know?
Ann: Yeah.
Aminatou: So like in a sick way it always makes me LOL. Like can we pause? Because our listeners also made a stink which is amazing. I don't need anybody to fight my battles on the Internet and when people do I'm always like whoa, like I'm impressed. People show up.
Ann: Yeah, you all were so enraged on our behalf. It was -- I mean like I said I was feel rage and feeling supported by all of you rage commenting as well. I was like I don't want to endorse an Internet frenzy in any context.
Aminatou: I know.
Ann: But it did -- I won't lie, it did feel good to feel supported by all of you.
Aminatou: Yeah. And here's the reason that it felt good too, because you and I are not shy. We said something immediately. We started working the phones. You better believe that if I'm angry on the Internet I'm angry at somebody on the phone too so that's what's happening. The thing that I was the most surprised by was getting so much feedback from people that were like this has happened with me before whether with Create and Cultivate or with somebody else and just this reinforcement of like oh yeah, I'm a creative on the Internet and somebody has done this to me before. And it's really enraging and thank you for saying something. And I'm like wow, maybe we should all say something when this happens because it is egregious and it happens all the time. Create and Cultivate, after some prodding, they worked to make it right. I'm always happy to not be on that side of an Internet crisis so I was like I don't know what's going on over there.
Ann: Right, but they did apologize and credit us and made a donation to the charity of our choice. I do want to say they did all the right things after the fact. Yeah.
Aminatou: Yeah, after the fact totally did. And I'm actually really happy with how we resolved it. It was addressed in the medium that the offense happened in. Good for them. It was a full-throat, unequivocal apology and I'm always down for that. I think that owning up to a mistake is great. I fall short a lot of times and that was a really good reminder and a model for me of how to act. And also they donated all of their fee to charities that we asked them to. So I think that on the Internet one day can seem like an entire year has gone by. [Laughter] But really it was resolved very fast. They were really great about it and I was like no more drama. Beef squashed.
Ann: Yeah. And it definitely got me thinking about we had the designer -- an illustrator Tuesday Bassen on the podcast a couple years ago to talk about Zara and other big clothing corporations stealing her designs in really egregious outright ways. It was not defensible at all, much like with Shine Theory. Like if you did a quick Google or if you lined up the terms and the timeline it's like wow, they are just openly stealing smaller sort of businesses' and artists' work. You know, those stories don't always have a happy ending. Like one of the good things in this case is because it was not a giant corporation with tons of legal power denying what was even going on we could resolve it in a way that felt good and felt just. Probably you're getting these as well but I heard from so many people who just get nowhere when their work is stolen in open ways like this and then monetized by someone else. So no such reprieve for the people selling weird knock-off Shine Theory swag on Red Bubble. I'm still looking at you and writing you nasty emails, not to send them more traffic, but there are other people monetizing this idea in ways that do not align with our politics. It's not like all is well in the land of intellectual property. But yeah, I am happy about the outcome of this story. And in general the opportunity to talk about how -- the complexities of this issue and who owns intellectual property, you know?
(13:00)
Aminatou: Yeah, you're right. It's like the reason this was resolved is nobody's a multinational mogul here even though trust me I could take down Mary Kay by myself if I needed to. Even though I have really enjoyed some Mary Kay products, I will say that for as much as I rag on them. One of the reasons that this got resolved too is the minute that you say you're about empowering women it's like okay, choose your fighter. Enter the arena. What are we doing? [Laughter] You know, what are we doing now? There is always going to be this tension between people who say that they're feminists and people who say that they're selling women's empowerment, two different things. But one thing that we do agree on is that we're all both for women. And there is a tension there too about getting paid, right? So there is the thing too that if you do feminist organizing or feminist work you shouldn't get paid and I'm like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, you know? I love money so that's my cross to bear. [Laughs] That's my issue I have to work on: I love feminism but also I love money so let's talk about it. At the end of the day that tension is what allowed us to have this conversation for real with the Create and Cultivate team and also address these larger topics. It's basically like capitalism fucks all of us over.
(14:18)
Ann: We've definitely talked about it in terms of the fashion world and certain brands and kind of celebrity feminism more in terms of saying one thing or signaling one thing that seems on its face political while your actions in private and also some of your actions in public, let's be real, do not align with your professed values. So I'm thinking about things like major fashion houses that put feminist slogans on clothing that is not size-inclusive, that is walked down runways by models that are exclusively white, that is made in ways that are not ecologically-sound or ethically considering the people who are meeting them. You know, the list goes on and on. And I think that for me it's like I'm not going to come for anyone who's making money off a shirt with a feminist slogan on it or who is making a lot of money doing conferences telling women how they can advance their careers. That's all well and good but just be honest about what you were doing and also make your businesses practices align with that.
Like if you're going to spout that publicly you should not be stealing from other women. You should be thinking about ethics in all of the choices you make which to be honest is hard. We try to consider our values and all of the choices we make in this small business that is Call Your Girlfriend but those values do get compromised by money, right? Like it's a dirty -- we did a whole episode about this.
Aminatou: All the time. We did a whole episode about that, right? And it's a thing we talk about, you, me and Gina privately, because it is really hard to say like these are our values then watch yourself -- the inclusion of money just changes the conversation all the time. I think that's a fair thing to acknowledge. It's very, very hard to be like women who we want to live and breathe our politics, you know? But at the same time we fall short. I see it all the time.
(16:10)
Ann: Yeah. And I think that where it gets tricky is sort of saying what is the burden of responsibility if your politics are part of your selling point? That's a thing that I keep thinking about. When I was rage Internetting and referred to the act of your modern feminist politics signaling not matching up to your actions behind-the-scenes I was like tongue-in-cheek LOL millennial pinkwashing, which P.S. millennial pink, a term coined by Veronique Hyland and Molly Fischer at The Cut, not by yours truly, credit again. But like, you know, that is more of an act of intentional deception like hey, we're a brand who's literally doing nothing and we're going to slap some empowerment on it versus the very real question of like hey, it's hard to make ethical choices and we're doing our best. I do think there is a difference.
Aminatou: There is a difference, right? And nobody is living up to their better self, their highest self, so let's put that all out there. And there is a part of me too that is honestly whenever I see that feminism is cool now I am really taken aback. Ten years ago I didn't think this would be possible. There is something really rad about that where I'm like oh, it is cool to e into women and it's cool to like women and to further women's causes.
Ann: Right.
Aminatou: You know, there is a part of me that's just like yeah, let the kids run wild with this stuff. [Laughter] But for me all I want is honesty and transparency, right? Here is in the ideal world what our values are and let's have a conversation about it. But don't pretend that you're doing the best for everybody if that's not true. Because I think that for me my for real sticking point about where the difference is between feminists and the empowerment people is who are you helping? And you can always tell. It's like if you're only helping yourself then I'm like case closed, bangs gavel, next case. [Laughter] I don't need to do . . . I see this so much with women's conferences where I'm just like wow, everybody here is just as lost as the next person but some people claim to be experts. And there is something about that that is just very -- it's just like very shady.
(18:15)
Ann: Yeah, and we've gone in on empowerment -- I'm air quoting here -- empowerment before. I want to re-recommend Andi Zeisler's 2016 article about empowertizing which we'll put in the show notes.
Aminatou: Yes.
Ann: And her book We Were Feminists Once which frankly I don't agree with every single thing she has to say in it but it's a very thoughtful examination of a lot of these issues about what happens when capitalism gets like, you know, superficially cozy with feminism.
Aminatou: Whew, so cozy. [Laughter] I'm like, you know, I'm talking all this big talk but you put a cashmere throw on me and I'm like whew, let's talk.
Ann: Right. Get a few of Oprah's favorite things into your life then yeah.
Aminatou: That's right. We're all wearing society's costume, let's be real.
Ann: Wow, that's so deep.
[Music and Ads]
(23:38)
Ann: So question though, I mean I think -- I can't remember if we've touched on this before, like the broader question of trying to attribute or be someone who is sharing things that you like or find funny or are inspired by on the Internet while also being an ethical consumer, right? Like this is sort of like being an ethical news consumer but applied to culture or applied to digital culture. Friend-of-the-podcast Doreen St. Felix, in 2015 she essentially wrote about the way teens, young creators on social media, predominantly black teens or young people of color, are making memes and doing things that are now reverberating through the culture and not seeing a penny of profits related to it. I mean obviously we're a few years later and Vine is gone, etc., etc., but the questions of who gets paid for intellectual property that really resonates on the Internet continue to be really relevant questions to be asking every time you're reposting a thing.
Aminatou: It's very stick but, you know, the thing that's very clear is just like in anything in capitalism somebody's getting exploited and somebody is not. [Laughs] So which side do you want to be on and what can you do to change it?
Ann: This is something that -- a point that she makes in this article from a few years ago. But the thing that I am struck by again and again is how the people who are in charge of budgets whether it be for doing a kind of sponsored integration or whether it's like I want to pay you to make a TV show or write a book or any other way of getting paid for making culture, those people are also statistically very reluctant to fund the types of creators who are actually fueling the Internet with all of these gems. Oh yeah, like we love it when it's free when it's always reverberated through the culture.
Aminatou: Yep.
Ann: But we don't want to pay you upfront to be brilliant and well-fed on our dime.
Aminatou: It sucks. I don't know how else to put it. And you see it happen over and over again. It's so weird that this article was written in 2015 because I feel like we're seeing it on steroids even more so now, right? Where like black cool Internet culture, it has really just infiltrated everywhere. Like all the brands are doing it. They're using all the shorthand. Like you would think every social media manager is black at every brand that I follow and that's not what's going on.
(26:00)
Ann: Yeah, monocle emoji to that. I'm like really?
Aminatou: When I think about how can I be a more -- like I'm not, I'm going to be honest, as somebody who posts Instagram stories on steroids I'm not going to look up where every meme is from. On some platforms frankly it's impossible, like Twitter does not let you find out. Whatever. I think that something just as easy as if you take a screenshot keep the source that you got the screenshot from, you know? Be a good referrer of traffic to other people. That is something that is so small, it costs you nothing, and it's literally what all of the big Instagram meme accounts don't do that's so frustrating. It's like Fat Jewish and whatever all those ones are called. Why wouldn't you want to be somebody who just like you have now shared with somebody else where you get your cool stuff from? There's nothing. That's so -- that's such an easy thing to do.
Ann: Yeah. And also just like the question too of when it comes to slang terms or ideas, not like a one-off joke but things that are more in the category of meme or concept or name for something, like the category that I would say Shine Theory fits into, a shorthand for a bigger thing that's maybe been around in a lot of different forms but this is a distillation of it. That's what a lot of memes are. That's what the policy and change . . .
Aminatou: That's why we all recognize them. [Laughs]
Ann: Right, and that's what I mean. I think that acknowledging also that there's work that goes into making a concept or a meme or something resonate. I think people have the impression that this stuff is easy or free for the creators as well and that is not the case. There's like time and energy and money and trademark fees involved. [Laughs]
Aminatou: I know. Man, now I'm remembering that woman who did a TED talk on Shine Theory and my blood pressure is rising all over again.
(27:50)
Ann: Yeah, there's a woman who did a TEDx talk -- okay -- who did a TEDx talk titled Shine Theory who did not originate this term obviously. And she did credit us but it's like my woman, can you please just come up with your own idea?
Aminatou: I know, come up with your own idea. Why do you think you get to do the TEDx talk on Shine Theory and not us? That is just -- it's so wild to me. And I think that a lot of it too is tied up in, you know, because we're cool Internet ladies or whatever.
Ann: Are we?
Aminatou: And we're all about sharing. You know, I think that a lot of times people think that we're being petty for talking about this stuff because I've heard that criticism before. It's just like oh, don't you guys say that you're all rah-rah women then the moment women steal from you you get angry? [Laughs] And I was like wow, listen to what you just said. Because as women we're conditioned a lot not to complain. Like all of that stuff seems messy. And I'm like no, actually if you don't fight for this stuff for yourself and for your own work it has larger repercussions. It's not okay and you're not being unreasonable for wanting to be credited for your work. It's like if anything women more than anybody want to be credited for their work.
Ann: Right.
Aminatou: I'm like that's why we have feminism. So, you know . . .
Ann: Are we allowed to talk about why we originally got the Shine Theory trademark? Did we sign something that said we couldn't talk about that?
Aminatou: I don't think so, no.
Ann: Okay, because I feel like this is a relevant story which is the article had come out in 2013 about Shine Theory but some months had passed. And because, I don't know, we had not learned this lesson yet we did not try to trademark it or buy the URL or do the things that we usually do.
Aminatou: Yeah, like the dog peeing on the tree, this is my tree thing.
Ann: We did not pee on Shine Theory.
Aminatou: Yeah, we did not do that with our Internet work. And in fact the only reason that we found out this was happening is because we were like oh, let's go buy our own website.
Ann: Right, back up. What was happening?
(29:50)
Aminatou: We were I believe having drinks and French fries somewhere. [Laughs]
Ann: We were definitely on our fourth glass of Rose and like second basket of French fries.
Aminatou: I know! And I don't know why we said let's buy this website and I got on my phone. Lo and behold shinetheory.com was some sort of gross workout fitness movement.
Ann: You clicked through and it was just pages of very muscular abs. It was almost like a fever dream where I was like how is this happening simultaneously? Did this other fitness person come up with the idea of Shine Theory simultaneously but differently?
Aminatou: Oh, it had all the language from your New York Magazine article. That's how we knew.
Ann: Right, it said "I don't shine if you don't shine," all of that stuff, but then it was just like abs.
Aminatou: Brought to you by New York Magazine's thing.
Ann: Oh yeah, it looked like it was endorsed by us! [Gasps] Right.
Aminatou: Yes, it looked like it was endorsed by us. And this was actually a really -- this was like a very good lesson for us. It's like 1) you've got to own the thing outright and 2) if you don't people will use it in ways that will infuriate you.
Ann: Right, like shine theory does not mean flats abs for every woman.
Aminatou: Yeah! And then us and this lady, you know, we had to go to Internet court to figure it out. [Laughs] It was not cool.
Ann: Yeah. I mean and so that is how we ended up owning the trademark after lots of dollars and effort and lawyering. Like seriously so much time and money. The email receipts of all of the time and money we spent to prevent this from becoming a thing used to sell fitness, it was a lot. I blocked it out. I really have blocked it out.
Aminatou: It's everything we hate to do. You know, logistics, legal mumbojumbo. And then . . .
Ann: Paying money.
Aminatou: Paying money. You know, paying money that's not going to Gucci loafers. It was a fight, it was like a real fight, and it felt really gross. It felt very, very gross. But anyway all is good in the realm now.
(31:48)
Ann: The difference between someone is trying to sell fitness stuff or trying to sell cosmetics versus someone just used the term without crediting us is vast. Like vast, vast, vast, right?
Aminatou: Exactly. Every time I pick up a Teen Vogue there's some new starlet who's dining out on Shine Theory.
Ann: Wow, eyeball emoji. [Laughs]
Aminatou: True, like Rowan Blanchard, Amanda Steinberg -- sorry if I'm saying their name wrong -- it doesn't annoy me or anything. But I'm also, you know, but then there's also my editor brain goes like wow, it would cost you nothing to be like "Here is where I learned this thing." And that's probably a muscle that we all need to exercise more especially when we're talking about liberation work and freedom and feminism and all those things because I find myself doing it all the time. You know, I'm trying to explain some sort of woke thing and I realize I'm like oh, the reason I know this is because I've read Audre Lorde or the reason I know this is because I'm reading XYZ. And it's so much easier if you go here is the foundational work that makes possible for this concept to just be disseminated out in the wild, right? Like right now a lot of people are talking about consent in sex and Hollywood and all this stuff. And I was like wow, the reason I know that is because of all the work that Jaclyn Friedman did, you know? Just making that so accessible. It's like you can say yes, consent matters and everybody knows what that means. When Jaclyn Friedman was editing her books and writing her books that was not a thing that was in the cultural consciousness.
Ann: Yeah, and the idea too that then you can help establish a breadcrumb trail right? Because I know from reading Jaclyn's work that she also cites the other thinkers that informed her thinking about consent. Like she's not like "Hello, it's me, the first person to use the word consent." So then you can create a way, if you cite Jaclyn, then somebody can go to Jaclyn's book and be like "Oh, what are the sources that she's citing?" Because all of this is definitely related and I think it's not ever a really clean story of here is one person. Like Shine Theory as a two-word term, yes, like that is you and me. But the concepts that go into that and the ways that we talk about it are informed by a lot of other thinkers.
(34:00)
Aminatou: Exactly. And we're not the first women in the world who are like "Oh, maybe you should embrace other women in your life." We certainly didn't invent that. So, you know, I think there's also an acknowledgment there. It's like there's nothing new under the sun and we would all be better for just citing our sources and saying where we learned things from. And also that's kind of a way that you make your idea go further is if you're like actually here are all the other smart people that are thinking about it.
Ann: Right, context.
Aminatou: Whew, context collapse. It's real. Okay, what else? I feel like this whole podcast today is going to be about capitalism.
Ann: Oh, always, the dirtiest game.
Aminatou: Pink capitalism.
[Music]
Ann: Do you want to take a listener question to this effect?
Aminatou: Yes, here's a question that we've gotten from a long-time listener, first-time emailer. "A question, and this may be more geared towards Amina given her location," way to put me on the spot long-time listener, first-time emailer, "what do you think about women's social clubs? Not to ruffle feathers or women webs." Women webs is amazing. "Or the Illuminati, but I'm thinking of The Wing in particular. I was accepted into their Soho location before it opened last year. I'm relatively new to New York and I miss my old city friends something fierce so I considered joining. I wouldn't use the space in any workspace capacity. I wouldn't need the facilities. My office has a gym, showers, etc. I could justify the cost of networking and friend-making. Then I gave it a second thought. Yes, I could swing the cost to essentially buy social access but how many other like-minded women would like to be members but couldn't because cost is a barrier to entry? When The Wing began it primarily marketed itself as a women's shared co-space. The 250 dollar/300 dollars a month justified as rent. It has now morphed itself into a 250 dollars a month woke social club. Thoughts?"
Ann: [Laughs]
(36:25)
Aminatou: I actually have a lot of thoughts about this. So full disclosure some of my best friends work at The Wing [Laughs] and I know the women who started The Wing. So let's explain what The Wing is. The Wing is just what this writer said: it is a women's social space in New York City that has now expanded to D.C. and I believe they're expanding to other places in the country. I do not belong to The Wing but I belong to other co-working spaces. Not even co-working spaces, like legit social places, social spaces. And I always find the ones that I'm at very interesting because they're very male and they're very white. What I have seen at The Wing is that all of the cool black women I know work either at The Wing, like for The Wing itself, or actually belong there.
So 1) I'm like you already get diversity points from me because I don't see this anywhere else. I think it's also interesting too that so many people have come to this question of should you sell access to a women's club? It's like the women who own the club get this but I never hear anybody talk about Soho House this way or Noya House or all of the other weird houses where they're like should all these rich, beautiful white people commune together exclusively all the time? Like I never hear that conversation.
(37:48)
Because I don't work there I can't talk about the working conditions but I do know they definitely have made it very accessible for women who couldn't afford it which is probably why it is so diverse and it is so cool. And I understand why people feel very strongly that it's a feminist space but it costs money to do. And the truth is that yeah, you're not going to work out of a beautiful Instagrammable space for free. That's just not going to happen.
Ann: Well I would say that I describe the conditions as at high risk for millennial pinkwashing. I think that is one reason why people are on high alert.
Aminatou: I think that's fair.
Ann: Yeah.
Aminatou: I think that's very fair. But I think that people should also examine why they are demanding such a high standard from this place and do they demand the same high standard from other places that they belong to, right? Like it sounds like a lot of money and I think it just depends on the person -- that's fair -- but also here is a business that is run by two women who have raised a lot of capital, something that almost never happens for women businesses, that is actually profitable and that is scaling. So I think that you need to look at the membership and say "What am I getting from this membership?" If the membership is different from, I don't know, the other social clubs or social activities that you belong to then probably you're getting a benefit from it right? And, you know, if the wing also is the only place where you meet cool, woke women that's something you should think about. It's like why is it this way and is this the only place you can get that? So to this listener I'm like I'm not going to tell you where to work out of. I think that it's right to examine the space this way but you should also ask yourself if you're this rigorous about everything else you spend money on.
Ann: Right. I mean I've seen this conversation collapsed into a like is it good or bad discussion about The Wing when really I'm much more interested in the fact that there are a variety of different types of women-oriented, membership-based spaces in lots of different cities. And I think it's actually much more interesting to say okay, rather than say . . . is the way The Wing is doing it and constructing its business good or bad for womanity? Like actually consider the fact that people -- women -- are showing us a lot of different ways to enact the idea of a woman-oriented space. So here in Los Angeles we have the Women's Center for Creative Work. I'm a member in that it costs ten dollars a month. There's community-oriented programming. It is less about being a business but it is also a workspace and it is also a community space and it's just showing you that The Wing is one way of enacting a type of space like this with certain types of perks and price points but actually there are a lot of different ways to do this idea and different aims for this idea.
Like if you look at the kind of About Us or like founding purpose statements for all of these places there is a difference. There's sort of a for-profit, this is clearly a business, we are appealing to a type of woman who maybe has these values. But yeah, at the end of the day you're getting concrete benefits like nice products in the bathroom and a place to work that looks cute on the Internet that's good for taking meetings or whatever versus other places that are much more explicitly about enacting feminism through community. And I think that's also an important thing, and I think to this, you know, I mean this question -- I know the question is like "What do you think of The Wing?" But I feel like the more operative question is "Hey, what's happening with structured women's membership organizations?" Like this person who wrote in says they don't need the workspace so it's like okay, you're actually talking about a different type of thing. No wonder you don't want The Wing because you don't want the professional perks. You just want the kind of programming and the feminist community aspect in which case there are other options. You know, this type of programming is at New Women's Space which is where we're having our New York blood drive which is more framed as a community-led event space. Their actual . . . let me see, their actual blurb is "Our mission is to build strong relationships, create economic opportunity, and inspire possibility for self-identified women, femme, queer, transgender, and gender non-conforming individuals. Like that's a very different mission than this is like a really cool workspace oriented to women. And so I think read the fine print about what your goals are or what the place's goals are and think about your own goals and then find a better match. And to be fair this is big city priv, right? Like the fact that we're talking about multiple options for funding this kind of structured community and space. But I always get really mad when this conversation is only about The Wing because not only does it ignore other types of more explicit, movement-oriented spaces that exist in the cities where The Wing is and is looking to expand, it clearly is not about the stated mission of even the for-profit ones like The Wing. Or there's one in San Francisco called The Assembly now and I think there's one in Portland.
Aminatou: Right.
(42:55)
Ann: Yeah, they proliferated.
Aminatou: And there's also something about -- so The Wing specifically, they have an in-house historian, Alexis Coe, that I've mentioned multiple times. And she talks a lot about the work of this exact kind of thing, like women-only spaces and how they were feminist and historical necessity. So I think thinking about why a space like this can exist and all the different iterations that it can exist in and which one fits your needs best is probably the way to frame the conversation as opposed to picking one out of the sky that seems like they're the poster child of capitalism and tearing it apart. There are real reasons for why all of these different spaces exist and the ways that they've evolved and the communication and the messaging that they use to talk about themselves.
Ann: Yeah, and I think it's also fair to . . . it's fair to ask questions based on their stated mission too. I mean like I'm reading now The Wing's mission is to create space for women to advance their pursuits and build community together, and so it's a fair question to ask to the point about access and income, what kind of community is this going to be and how are you doing that? To which the answer might be reduced admission fees or explicitly making women of color feel welcome here. You know, there are ways to answer that question and if they don't have answers to them by all means write them off. But I think that's what it is. It's like what is the mission and how are they actually enacting it is the standard.
(44:20)
Aminatou: Yeah, I think that's fair. And I think to go back to the larger point of even -- to tie this all back in with a bow with how we started the show talking about our beef with Create and Cultivate, it's really easy to come to a place where all you want to do is be angry and be reactionary because in the immediate you can't find the answers to the questions that you have. But really taking a beat and asking the question, giving people the benefit of the doubt until you know otherwise is probably the one way that we're not all going to drive each other up the wall on the Internet.
Ann: Right.
Aminatou: It's like ask first. If the answer is not satisfactory then by all means take action. But your instinct should not be to rage and I think it's so easy to rage on women online.
Ann: Right. Yeah, and so totally fair to ask these questions about The Wing or anywhere but it's also fair to ask yourself why you're only asking them about The Wing instead of looking at further options/other ways to build community too because a physical space is definitely not the only way to do that. Especially in places where physical space is expensive and scarce which is another part of this trouble too. Like we're always saying capitalism is so dirty.
Aminatou: Capitalism is so dirty. Whew.
Ann: Ugh. Wow, glad we solved it. I love how that is my temptation after every hard conversation where I feel uncomfortable about the fact that it's all just a big hot mess and muddled to be like well . . . we did that. [Laughs]
(45:55)
Aminatou: That's how I feel. I'm like I just talked a big game and now I'm going to go organize all my beauty products. [Laughs] Capitalism. Yeah, I'm like staring at -- yeah, my coffee table is strewn with capitalist face serums. So, you know, it's a process. We're all doing our best.
Ann: I love the idea of an anti-capitalist face serum. What would that even be? I can't even . . . [Laughs]
Aminatou: That's like re-purposing the yogurt in your house for a face mask.
Ann: Ooh, you're so right. That is anti-capitalist serum.
Aminatou: I know, but listen, every time I've tried to make homemade face things I always end up eating them. One of them was like -- it was like avocado and honey and you have to mash it all, and I was like wait, this is delicious. [Laughs]
Ann: Basically a smoothie, yeah.
Aminatou: Yes, and then I put -- and I was like yeah, this is not going to work for me. The only way that I'm not going to eat creams is if I can't lick the thing.
Ann: Or the label is in like Japanese and you don't know if it's toxic. [Laughs]
Aminatou: I know. You can't ask me to mash avocado and a banana and not eat it. That's wild.
Ann: All right, I'm going to let you go eat your face masks . . .
Aminatou: [Laughs]
Ann: And live to fight another day.
Aminatou: Oh my gosh, I'm going to send you so many pictures. I found a really good tea tree mask that I'm really into.
Ann: Oh my god, do it. Also before we go yet another reminder that our blood drives are all in full-swing. Many of them are starting to fill up but that doesn't mean you can't walk in on the date. We definitely welcome several walk-ins at all these locations. And you can sign up to donate another time. There's info on all of the different cities' pages on our site plus if you're not in one of the cities where we're doing a blood drive there's more info about that too at callyourgirlfriend.com/blooddrive. The San Francisco drive was a resounding success. We helped save the lives of 149 people.
(47:50)
Aminatou: Everybody who is giving blood and tagging us on Instagram and Twitter I want you to know that I cry every single time so thank you. It means the world to me.
Ann: Yeah. Love you so much. I will see you on the Internet.
Aminatou: See you on the Internet, boo-boo!
Ann: Bye.
Aminatou: You can find us many places on the Internet, on our website callyourgirlfriend.com, you can download it anywhere you listen to your favorite podcasts, or on Apple Podcasts where we would love it if you left us a review. You can email us at callyrgf@gmail.com. We're on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook at @callyrgf. You can subscribe to our monthly newsletter The Bleed on the Call Your Girlfriend website. You can even leave us a short and sweet voicemail at 714-681-2943. That's 714-681-CYGF. Our theme song is by Robyn, all original music is composed by Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs, our logos are by Kenesha Sneed, and this podcast is produced by Gina Delvac.
Ann: Also a quick note that we could not have survived that initial trademark drama without the quick and capable help of our lawyer Quinn Harrity at Harrity Law who is always in our corner and especially when it comes to us trying to get our heads around this from a legal perspective which is not always easy. She is like, ugh, a number one.