Life

Links for Later: The What-a-Week Edition

Not without a fight. Image by Getty Images

By Phoebe Maltz Bovy November 10, 2016

It’s Thursday, so I have some links for you, Sisterhood readers. A female presidential candidate — not a Jewish one, but one who received a whole bunch of anti-Semitic attacks, on her and her supporters — was just defeated. I’m still grappling with that, and would not be surprised if you are as well.

-Have your tears from Clinton’s concession speech dried? Get ready to sob again: Stephen Hiltner writes about the New York Times “Madam President” headline that never was. There’s a photo of the mock-up of that cover. “To some, the image you see here is a painful reminder of a historic presidency that did not come to pass.”

-On Buzzfeed, Doree Shafrir reminds: “White women may have voted for Trump, but Jewish women did not.” Shafrir writes powerfully about the new anti-Semitism. Read the whole thing.

-Aaron Sorkin wrote a letter to his daughter and her mother, except not just to them, because it’s in Vanity Fair. He’s furious about Trump, as an American and as a Jew, which is fantastic. That he addresses his 15-year-old daughter and a grown woman (his wife? his ex-wife?) as the “Sorkin Girls,” and that the whole thing reads as if it was written to two children, and then is signed “Dad,” is a bit less so, but I’m feeling indulgent towards anyone who’s on the right side of this mess.

And now, some moderately lighter news from across the pond:

-Prince Harry’s girlfriend, Meghan Markle, is older (than he is), American, black, and… a resident of Toronto, all facts one might find surprising if one is familiar with how British royals tend to do things. (If the couple needs any Toronto coffee-shop recommendations, I’m available!) On a more serious note, tabloids and trolls have been harassing Markle and her family, and there’s now an official royal document telling them to back off. Progress!

-In the New Statesman, Amelia Tait responds to news that New Balance supports Trump with a clever ranking of shoes from most to least fascist. As the owner of non-Hunter rain boots (and nothing Ivanka-branded, ever, thanks), I’m feeling OK about the list. Not about the state of the world, but my footwear choices. It’s something.

Phoebe Maltz Bovy edits the Sisterhood, and can be reached at bovy@forward.com. Her book, The Perils of “Privilege”, will be published by St. Martin’s Press in March 2017.

Phoebe Maltz Bovy is a former editor of the Sisterhood blog at the Forward. Her writing has appeared in several publications, including The New Republic and The Atlantic. Her book, “The Perils of ‘Privilege,’” was published by St. Martin’s Press in March 2017. She has a PhD in French and French Studies from New York University, and has read a lot of 19th century French Jewish newspapers for a 21st century American.

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