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Reposted by Emily Witt

Richard Hull

@richardhull54.bsky.social

Really excellent essay review by @embits.bsky.social in @lrb.co.uk on the #manosphere and Andrew Tate. It makes very disturbing reading but it is important we all understand these phenomena.
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www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

The anxieties Tate addresses are real, which is part of the reason his sales pitch is so effective. ‘The system is deliberately designed to oppress and keep people working jobs which barely pay their rent and everyone is semi-depressed,’ he tells Tahsin and Shea. ‘But it doesn’t matter because the elites get to do whatever they want. So, the rules are for poor people. And when you understand how to break the rules, then you can find a very easy way to become rich.’ It’s not just rules that are for simps, but manners, decorum and kindness too. Some of his power, like Trump’s, comes from his acknowledgment that traditional paths to economic and social stability are increasingly blocked off, and in ways that undermine traditional markers of masculine success. ‘We live in a world where you cannot play fair any more,’ he says.

In a recent interview in Jacobin, the anthropologist Kristen Ghodsee described the theories of the manosphere and its female counterpart, the tradwife, as ‘individual escape fantasies’ – a dream that there is some way out of material and social reality, and that the key to comfort, protection and meaning in life is deciphering the messages sent by your endocrine system. ‘It’s sad,’ Ghodsee said, ‘because there’s almost a nascent anti-capitalist impulse here being hijacked toward reactionary ends.’ The clips of young mothers with facial fillers wearing eyelet dresses and stirring with wooden spoons, the thick-necked men discussing their paleo diets and their crypto positions – even the videos of the morning dew on a banana yellow sports car – bely a desperation. If the keys to the good life have been discovered, why this incessant gabbing at the camera?

September 15, 2025 at 2:03 PM

Reposted by Emily Witt

London Review of Books

@lrb.co.uk

Our new issue 47.16 is now online, featuring:

@tomstevenson.bsky.social in El Salvador
Kasia Boddy on Dorothy Parker
Seamus Perry on Richard Ellmann’s biography of James Joyce
Ruby Hamilton on David Lynch
and Emily Witt (@embits.bsky.social) on the manosphere.

Read online at lrb.co.uk

September 3, 2025 at 12:03 PM

Reposted by Emily Witt

Committee to Protect Journalists

@pressfreedom.bsky.social

An entire news crew working for Al Jazeera was killed by Israel as they sought to bring the world firsthand reporting from #Gaza.

Among them was prominent journalist Anas Al-Sharif, who had been previously smeared and threatened by the IDF.

#NotATarget

Full statement: cpj.org/2025/08/isra...

Israel kills Al Jazeera journalists in targeted Gaza City airstrike - Committee to Protect Journalists

New York, August 10, 2025—The Committee to Protect Journalists is appalled to learn of the killing today of Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al-Sharif, Mohammed Qreiqeh, camera operators Ibrahim Zaher and M...

cpj.org

August 11, 2025 at 1:27 AM

Emily Witt

@embits.bsky.social

www.404media.co/ice-is-using...

ICE Is Using a New Facial Recognition App to Identify People, Leaked Emails Show

The new tool, called Mobile Fortify, uses the CBP system which ordinarily takes photos of people when they enter or exit the U.S., according to internal ICE emails viewed by 404 Media. Now ICE is usin...

www.404media.co

June 26, 2025 at 4:50 PM

Reposted by Emily Witt

Los Angeles Times

@latimes.com

Most nabbed in L.A. raids were men with no criminal conviction, picked up off the street

A Times analysis found that 69% of those arrested during that period had no criminal conviction and 58% had never been charged with a crime.

www.latimes.com

June 25, 2025 at 12:25 AM

Reposted by Emily Witt

Jorie Graham

@joriegraham.bsky.social

Spectacular reporting & heartbreaking writing by Emily Witt @newyorker.com

The People Being Disappeared by ICE in Los Angeles www.newyorker.com/news/letter-...

The People Being Disappeared by ICE in Los Angeles

As communities across Southern California document and protest the escalating raids, loved ones grapple with the unimaginable.

www.newyorker.com

June 22, 2025 at 5:16 PM

Reposted by Emily Witt

The New Yorker

@newyorker.com

There are now more military stationed in L.A. than in Iraq and Syria. Emily Witt reports on the anti-ICE demonstrations and federal presence in the city.

Looking for the National Guard in Los Angeles

President Trump’s assertions that federal troops have saved the city from destruction did not appear to reflect reality.

www.newyorker.com

June 11, 2025 at 4:15 PM

Emily Witt

@embits.bsky.social

I wrote about Bernie and AOC's visit to Tucson for @newyorker.com

The New Yorker @newyorker.com · Mar 25

At the “Fight Oligarchy” tour stop in Arizona, Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez hammered home a single message: the government has been taken hostage by a cabal of billionaires, and the only way to wrest it back is by unifying the working class.

Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Fight the Oligarchy

In Arizona, a crowd of thousands suggested that the left still has a pulse.

www.newyorker.com

March 25, 2025 at 4:56 PM

Emily Witt

@embits.bsky.social

I wrote about Trump's executive order targeting gender care for children and the fallout in New York and other cities. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...