Dingus of the week: Rod Dreher and everyone who hates single cat ladies
Don't tempt us with a good time
The weekly dingus would not exist without paying subscribers. The dingus newsletter is where I make fun of someone or something in the news that’s all made our lives a little worse. And remember, I’ve been calling these weird little dinguses weird since 2021. Am I saying I was Tim Walzing before being Tim Walzing was cool? Maybe.
In the past couple of weeks, thousands and thousands of people have hopped on Zoom calls to raise money for Kamala Harris’ campaign. The calls were organized around identity groups like Black women, Latinas, South Asian women, white women, and white men.
This momentum resulted in millions of dollars being raised for the Harris campaign and a lot of men absolutely losing their ever-loving minds.
One man in particular, Rod Dreher, tweeted a screenshot of Arielle Fodor, a former teacher who goes by Mrs Frazzled on TikTok, commenting, “Imagine this woman in your face, forever. She may not be childless or have cats, but I think this is EXACTLY what JDV meant by ‘childless cat ladies’ telling us all what to do.”
Apparently, the sin Fodor committed was smiling, laughing, and having a good time on a Zoom. For Dreher, a woman having a good time means a prison sentence. Because how dare she? THE AUDACITY! Look at her, with that great skin, green eyes and wide, effusive smile. Disgusting. This is the future those sick liberals want. One where women can just join Zooms willy-nilly and LAUGH? Is this what you want, you perverted decadent freaks? Women should be frowning and churning butter, like the Lord God declared in Manlations 34:17.
If you don’t know who Rod Dreher is, and I can’t imagine many of you do, he’s basically like a more divorced and less employed David Brooks. Rod Dreher is like if Charlie Kirk got really old and less successful. The main things Dreher has done recently are: get really excited about Hungary’s far-right leader Viktor Orban; become very upset about the Paris Olympics because he thinks it will lead to more anal sex; and of course, become really mad at a random woman online because she smiled during a Zoom call.
When I saw Dreher’s tweet, I replied and said, “This is why you are divorced, my man.” In response, a bunch of men got really mad at me. One even made a cartoon of me lying on a couch, petting a cat, next to a bottle of wine, a dildo, a Hamilton poster, and some prescription medications. He meant it as an insult, but I found the picture quite charming. Like, look at me, chilling with my pets and taking care of my mental health.
This isn’t the first time someone has tried to insult me online by telling me I have cats and that I am alone, and it won’t be the last. It’s a common way to insult women. More than one person I’ve dated has thrown that at me during a breakup: “Have fun being alone with your cats!” First of all, they are dogs, and second of all, I will, thank you so much. Enjoy telling some girl on Hinge about your protein goals, sir. What Dreher, JD Vance, and my photoshopping superfan are voicing is their fear, not ours.
It’s the fear of that thing happening to them that they’ve done to others for so long, the fear of becoming marginalized.
For so long, society has posited that the keys to a happy life for women are marriage, children, and home. But marriage has been a violent trap and an engine of inequality; children are unaffordable and also sometimes people don’t want to have them and also having them further drives inequality. As for houses, well, who can afford them in this economy? In response, people have learned to exist outside of those confining parameters — redefining relationships and the concept of home.
In response to changing norms and the difficulties associated with raising children or buying a home, many people have adopted different ideas of what success and happiness look like. But that wasn’t supposed to be the plan. We were supposed to feel miserable on the outside. We were supposed to wring our hands and wail about what men wanted and how we could make ourselves more appealing to them so that they’d take us under their wings and force us to give birth without an epidural. And maybe for a while we did. We Bridget Jonesed for so long — starving ourselves, swiping right, smiling through exhausting dates, all for the imagined prize of settling down with someone who can’t find the ketchup in the grocery store and calls watching their own damn children “babysitting.”
As a result women are breaking. In 2016 we saw that we could no longer ignore the strain of virulent misogyny that ran through our culture and politics (yes, even liberal politics). And in 2020 we saw that there was no social safety net, only us and our uncompensated labor.
Because cats, wine, and a dildo? Sign me up. I’ll even play the Hamilton soundtrack on repeat if it’s necessary.
In her recent book, sociologist Jessica Calarco writes about a man she calls Dennis, who thinks universal childcare is a great idea but doesn’t want to give up the perks of having a stay-at-home wife. Life is just “easier” if he lets his wife take care of the children. After reading Calarco’s book, I think about Dennis a lot. How yeah, I’d be sad to give up the perks of patriarchy if they came with childcare and a nice home-cooked dinner every night. If that were my life, then yes, the idea of being alone with cats and wine might seem empty and sad.
But that’s not my life, nor has it ever been. My life was the one where I cooked, cleaned, and took care of the kids. My life was the one that had to be broken so someone else could succeed.
And people are opting out. This is the reason why my book was a New York Times bestseller, as was Leslie Jamison’s book about her divorce. It’s the reason why people are greedily reading Sarah Manguso and Glynnis MacNicol. It’s the reason some 70 percent of divorces are initiated by women. Because cats, wine, and a dildo? Sign me up. I’ll even play the Hamilton soundtrack on repeat if it’s necessary.
My autonomy is my joy.
And now for something good
Team “Fuck Around and Find Out” won gold
And of course, Suni Lee is a Midwestern princess.
Women’s basketball endorsing Kamala Harris
Snoop Dogg is now the president, I am so sorry, I don’t make the rules.
Flavor Flav is a hype guy for women’s water polo. That’s praxis.
Jason Kelce in a beret! (This is actually the future liberals want. We want all current and former NFL players to put on jaunty little caps.)
Are all my good things about sports? Yes. If that’s so wrong, send me to happy woman prison, where we play with cats, and talk about how delightfully selfish we are.
Newsletter news
This week, MYAM hit over 50,000 subscribers! This is a huge milestone and I am so proud of the work we do here. This week, I spent a lot of time doing volunteer work for the Iowa Abortion Access Fund and realized that I could not do that work if it weren’t for this newsletter. And so many of you have shown up to help the fund with recurring donations. It gives me so much hope. Like yes, things are bad and will be bad here, but we have hope.
Also, I began booking guests for the next season of the podcast, which is slated to begin rolling out in September!!
I am so excited for some of the guests I have for Season 2. I am not going to jinx it and tell you who, but one of the guests' names rhymes with Sam Davage.
But we need your stories! One of the best parts of the podcast was the voice memos you all sent about your divorce stories.
You can record a voicemail for me on Speakpipe. Speakpipe has an easy user interface and I want to hear your voice. I will be using these stories in my podcast. Please anonymize your stories. But I will be asking for your real name and contact information just to make sure you are a real person.
You can also send an email to menyellatme@gmail.com. Tell me your stories there! I will be reading your stories on the podcast with special guests.
Also, subscribe to the newsletter! This next season of the podcast will include subscriber-only episodes. And in a world of collapsing media, your subscriptions help me be able to make fun newsletters and even more fun podcasts.
What I am drinking
Last night, I got the chance to be in conversation with one of my literary heroes, Sarah Manguso. I first read Sarah Manguso’s Ongoingness when my children were small and my marriage was falling apart. I learned later that Sarah read my newsletter at a similar time in her life.
Her book Liars is such a gripping story of a perfectly normal horror that we have all lived at least once in our own way.
It reminds me of the way our stories matter and how preserving our right to define our lives on our terms is one of the most radical acts we have.
And that pairs well with a decent enough wine at a quiet Irish pub and loads of new friends.
Men are afraid when women laugh. Not giggles or titters or any of the other cute noises, but the full-throated mirth that makes some fools suspect we are laughing at them.
give the superfan some points -- they picked a vibe with a clit stimulator. I wouldn't have thought they'd have acknowledged the clit, let alone included it in the fun!