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.
Phoebe Maltz Bovy
By Phoebe Maltz Bovy
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Life ‘Oh Man, Do I Look Too Jewish?’
On the latest Blabbermouth podcast, which I intend to finish listening to an an upcoming poodle-walk, reporter Sydney Brownstone, who has been covering the Standing Rock protests, turns to a more personal topic: “I have lived for 26 years under the illusion that I am unconditionally white, for example, and in pictures recently I have…
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Life Links for Later: the ‘Papa Don’t Preach’ Edition
-Teen Vogue, a more politically-engaged publication than one might assume, posted a video with interviews with young Jewish women, on their reactions to Steve Bannon’s role as a top Trump advisor. -Sarah Weinman has a moving essay in Hazlitt about breast cancer and body image: “I didn’t take pictures because then, the idea embarrassed me….
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Life Mandatory Fetus-Funerals Coming to Texas
New rules in Texas — not proposed rules or rules speculated in the abstract in a philosophy seminar, but actual, real-life rules — require medical facilities that perform abortions to treat fetal tissue as dead bodies, either burying or cremating the tissue in question. A chilling sentence from Tracy Clark-Flory’s Vocativ piece on the story…
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Life Natalie Portman Is Getting Her First Christmas Tree — and Fulfilling ‘Every Jew’s Secret Wish’
On “The Tonight Show” last night, Natalie Portman filled in Jimmy Fallon on her plans for this year’s overlapping Christmas and Hanukkah, a calendar coincidence Portman called “really nice.” As she told Fallon, her family celebrates Christmas with her in-laws and Hanukkah with her side of the family. This year, it’s going to be one…
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The Schmooze The ‘War on Christmas’ May Have Inspired Donald Trump’s Political Career
A million, zillion years ago, before trans issues entered the mainstream, and before anyone had any idea how Mark Lilla felt about gender-neutral bathrooms, there was another anti-‘political-correctness’ topic-du-jour: the so-called War on Christmas. Much as society is now splitting down the lines of those who think it’s just basic human decency to call people…
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Life Why We Forgive Rory Gilmores and Ivanka Trumps but not Hannah Horvaths and Hillary Clintons
I’ve spent the last day or so preoccupied by a question: Why is Hannah Horvath, Lena Dunham’s “Girls” protagonist, this villain, not just an anti-heroine but (conflated with her creator) blamed for the election of Donald Trump… while Rory Gilmore, that other television-show protagonist, is… fine, somewhat despised in light of her reappearance in the…
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Life Kickass Jewish Woman of the Day: Attorney Carrie A. Goldberg
In the New Yorker, Margaret Talbot profiles Carrie Goldberg, “a thirty-nine-year-old Brooklyn attorney with a practice specializing in sexual privacy, a new field of law that has emerged, in large part, to confront some of the grosser indulgences of the Internet.” Goldberg represents victims of what’s commonly known as revenge porn, although as Goldberg makes…
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Life Should We Separate ‘Real’ Bigotry from the Armchair Variety?
At Mother Jones, Kevin Drum wondered why everyone’s talking about “white supremacy” these days, rather than just talking about “racism.” Had he wondered this, oh, I don’t know, in June, this might have been a contrarian but useful point: In one understanding “white supremacy” is the entire system, encompassing everything from racist beauty standards to…
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