Obama uses a women's magazine to talk to men
If you haven’t read President Obama’s essay on feminism in the September issue of Glamour, do. It combines cultural analysis with personal witness—and on the latter front, the president writes as a father of girls but avoids the perils of high dad feminism. It’s great.
A friend notes, “now if we could get this type of article to be printed in men's magazines, too.” Indeed. Obama addresses in detail the way sexism hurts men, not just women. He argues that men need to be actively involved in fighting it. Thomas Page McBee calls the essay “a step-by-step guide from one of the most powerful men on earth about how to be a better man.“ So why isn’t it appearing in Esquire or GQ?
Yet a male president’s byline on a Glamour exclusive makes a powerful statement before the main text even begins. “It’s radical that he wrote it in a women’s magazine,” writes Lucia Graves, “a category of media that’s been written off as fluff by political literati for practically as long as they’ve been around.” Glamour does a lot that is definitely not fluff, yet “they still, in 2016, have to fight to be taken seriously.” This helps a little.
