Thirty years ago, in the inaugural issue of Ms. magazine, Letty Cottin Pogrebin wrote a landmark essay in which she assailed the patriarchal system that positions women as competitors. When a woman’s identity is “deprived of nourishment,” she wrote, “it fights; and the most convenient target is another victim.” The rules, she explained, are straightforward. First, “if you feel depressed, don’t examine your discontent—find a woman who’s worse off than you are.” Second, “if you doubt your attractiveness, don’t question the standards of beauty—outdo and outdress every woman in sight.” Next, if
...more
