Our opening clip featured the poet June Jordan reciting her powerful piece A Menace to My Enemies. Jordan is a sheroe of this week’s guest, the unstoppable Mona Eltahawy: journalist, feminist firebrand, and global truth-teller whose voice cuts through the noise like no one else.

Mona is the author of Headscarves and Hymens, The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls, and her latest, Bloody Hell!: Adventures in Menopause From Around the World. Her work spans continents and revolutions, from the frontlines of Egypt’s Arab Spring to the ongoing fight against patriarchy, white supremacy, and fascism everywhere. She’s here to inspire rebellion, liberation, and the refusal to be silenced.

Want to be part of conversations like this? Join the Gaslit Nation Salon, live every Monday at 4pm ET on Zoom. Meet fellow listeners, trade insights, vent your rage, and help build a living archive of resistance.

Sign up at Patreon.com/Gaslit. Annual memberships are discounted, and to everyone who already supports the show—thank you. You make this space possible.

Looking for a summer read that pairs well with revolution? Pick up the Gaslit Nation graphic novel, Dictatorship: It’s Easier Than You Think! Follow our shady narrator, Judge Lackey, as he bumbles through the dark comedy of authoritarianism, dodging accountability and panicking over activists and journalists. Find it at your local library or at Bookshop.org.

EVENTS AT GASLIT NATION:

• August 25 4pm ET – Join the Gaslit Nation Book Club for a powerful discussion on The Lives of Others and I’m Still Here, two films that explore how art and love endure and resist in the face of dictatorship.

• Minnesota Signal group for Gaslit Nation listeners in the state to find each other, available on Patreon.

• Vermont Signal group for Gaslit Nation listeners in the state to find each other, available on Patreon.

• Arizona-based listeners launched a Signal group for others in the state to connect, available on Patreon.

• Indiana-based listeners launched a Signal group for others in the state to join, available on Patreon.

• Florida-based listeners are going strong meeting in person. Be sure to join their Signal group, available on Patreon.

• Have you taken Gaslit Nation’s HyperNormalization Survey Yet?

• Gaslit Nation Salons take place Mondays 4pm ET over Zoom and the first ~40 minutes are recorded and shared on Patreon.com/Gaslit for our community

Want to enjoy Gaslit Nation ad-free? Join our community of listeners for bonus shows, exclusive Q&A sessions, our group chat, invites to live events like our Monday political salons at 4pm ET over Zoom, and more! Sign up at Patreon.com/Gaslit!

Show Notes:

June Jordan reciting her poem “A Menace to My Enemies” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L898_qsfv7M

If you're still waiting for someone to save democracy, Mona Eltahawy has news for you: you are the one you’ve been waiting for.

A fearless Egyptian-American journalist and author of The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls and her latest book Bloody Hell!: Adventures in Menopause From Around the World, Eltahawy is no stranger to authoritarianism. While covering Arab Spring protests in Cairo, she was seized by Egyptian security forces and sexually assaulted and beaten, her arm and hand broken. Now, she warns, America is slipping toward the same strongman rule in Egypt. And too many are sleepwalking through it.

Eltahawy's prescription is feminism that terrifies, carried out by both women and men. Because anyone can be a feminist. This is feminism as revolution. As she puts it, “There is no revolution without rage, and there is no revolution without risk.”

Her work urges women to embrace power, ambition, anger, and militant self-defense, not to provoke, but to defend. And for their allies to support them. Learn to protect yourself. Teach your daughters common-sense self-defense and how to take up space.

Her hope is that more of us, especially white women in the U.S., will stop cosplaying resistance and start embodying it. “The Handmaid’s Tale is not a documentary,” she says. “Get out of the TV and into the streets.”

EVENTS AT GASLIT NATION:

• August 25 4pm ET – Join the Gaslit Nation Book Club for a powerful discussion on The Lives of Others and I’m Still Here, two films that explore how art and love endure and resist in the face of dictatorship.

• Minnesota Signal group for Gaslit Nation listeners in the state to find each other, available on Patreon.

• Vermont Signal group for Gaslit Nation listeners in the state to find each other, available on Patreon.

• Arizona-based listeners launched a Signal group for others in the state to connect, available on Patreon.

• Indiana-based listeners launched a Signal group for others in the state to join, available on Patreon.

• Florida-based listeners are going strong meeting in person. Be sure to join their Signal group, available on Patreon.

• Have you taken Gaslit Nation’s HyperNormalization Survey Yet?

• Gaslit Nation Salons take place Mondays 4pm ET over Zoom and the first ~40 minutes are recorded and shared on Patreon.com/Gaslit for our community

Show Notes:

Journalist On Being Sexual 'Prey' In Egypt https://www.npr.org/2011/11/29/142895349/journalist-on-being-sexual-prey-in-egypt

Want to enjoy Gaslit Nation ad-free? Join our community of listeners for bonus shows, exclusive Q&A sessions, our group chat, invites to live events like our Monday political salons at 4pm ET over Zoom, and more! Sign up at Patreon.com/Gaslit!

Our show opens with Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata, a favorite of philosopher Kate Manne, one of the sharpest minds dissecting power, privilege, and the politics of gender.

Kate is a professor at Cornell University and the author of groundbreaking books like Down Girl, Entitled, and her latest, Unshrinking, which takes on fatphobia with the same fearless clarity she brings to misogyny and moral philosophy. Her work is a lifeline for understanding how injustice is baked into our culture, and how we can start dismantling it. If you’ve ever felt the weight of double standards, moral policing, or body shame, Kate Manne has words that will crack open your world and help put it back together stronger.

Want to keep the conversation going? Join the Gaslit Nation Salon, live every Monday at 4pm ET. It’s our weekly Zoom gathering where we break down the headlines, swap strategies, share survival tips, and connect with other listeners who get it.

Sign up at Patreon.com/Gaslit. Discounted annual memberships are available, and we’re so grateful to everyone who keeps the show going.

Need a summer read to match the moment? Check out the Gaslit Nation graphic novel, Dictatorship: It’s Easier Than You Think! Follow our cunning narrator, Judge Lackey, as he bumbles through the dark art of authoritarianism, clinging to power and dodging those meddling activists and journalists. Find it at your local library or at BookShop.org.

EVENTS AT GASLIT NATION:

• August 25 4pm ET – Join the Gaslit Nation Book Club for a powerful discussion on The Lives of Others and I’m Still Here, two films that explore how art and love endure and resist in the face of dictatorship.

• Minnesota Signal group for Gaslit Nation listeners in the state to find each other, available on Patreon.

• Vermont Signal group for Gaslit Nation listeners in the state to find each other, available on Patreon.

• Arizona-based listeners launched a Signal group for others in the state to connect, available on Patreon.

• Indiana-based listeners launched a Signal group for others in the state to join, available on Patreon.

• Florida-based listeners are going strong meeting in person. Be sure to join their Signal group, available on Patreon.

• Have you taken Gaslit Nation’s HyperNormalization Survey Yet?

• Gaslit Nation Salons take place Mondays 4pm ET over Zoom and the first ~40 minutes are recorded and shared on Patreon.com/Gaslit for our community

Want to enjoy Gaslit Nation ad-free? Join our community of listeners for bonus shows, exclusive Q&A sessions, our group chat, invites to live events like our Monday political salons at 4pm ET over Zoom, and more! Sign up at Patreon.com/Gaslit!