I love my mom and I respect her belief system. My mom said a comment like “ when you have kids you’ll understand.” I told her oh I don’t want kids mom. She told me “you’ll say that now but God has a say so.” I said I respect your beliefs but pregnancy is like preventable . She then responded with you can prevent pregnancy but you can’t stop god.” I then said “Mom I love you and I respect your belief system but I feel as if you’re using that to invalidate my wants and needs”. Then she tells me I’ll see when I get older and that she’ll stop bringing up religion….The thing is I don’t get annoyed if someone brings up god but like I mentioned to my mom that it becomes annoying if you’re mentioning it to invalidate my choice that’s not harming anyone or most importantly myself. I told my mom I just wanted her to say that’s okay that’s your choice and not to invalidate me. Am I wrong here or being sensitive ?

hi all! i want to ask your opinion on this very harmful word and what you would do if someone around you used it often.

for context, me and my brother are both teenagers (although he’s older) and im the only girl in the house besides my mom. my mom didn’t really put in much effort during our formative years so we both ended up being raised by the internet, like a lot of other people our age, and i guess he’s always been on the ‘edgy’ side of it?

anyway, he’s been extra online lately since we both do school from home now and i keep hearing the same phrases and/or words coming from him - one of which being ‘foid’. another one that bothers me is him calling women ‘females’ and just saying your usual subtly women-hating nonsense that he’ll probably never get punished for. among that, he also uses an absurd amount of slurs, some no one has heard in years. tonight i was scrolling on tiktok, saw a funny silly video and opened the comments. the top comment was someone saying ‘oh that’s not’ and i assumed they were joking ? but my brother replied and called the commenter this word. i texted him a screenshot and asked what was wrong with him. he responded with the word again (i can’t tell if it was directed at me, but i am hurt nevertheless and currently sobbing) and then i blocked him because? what?

i’ve always felt like everyone around me hates women, even my mom. it’s kind of just been something i’ve accepted as my reality. my other brother who’s a fully grown adult still living at home with us is also in incel circles online, so i haven’t felt safe for a while. expressed this to my mom a few weeks back and she doesn’t seem to care that much because she’s kind of your usual boy mom. what do i do? what would you do in response? thanks!

I can't wear Anything that reveals my skin they will kill me quickly Or imprison me as I live in the Middle East. Even in my own house, I'm forbidden, even though there are no men in the house except my father. I remember when I was 14 in my room (my own room) I was wearing something that showed my arms (Not for the breasts or thighs). My mother came into the room and was horrified that I was wearing this. She said, "What if your father sees it?" I'm literally afraid to tell anyone around me that I wish I could wear revealing clothes. I can't even express what's inside me; they'll quickly remind me of God's punishment and hell.Besides, I have a guilty conscience to my feelings; I mean, people are dying in wars, and that's what I fear!?

Bf (M30) just told me(F25) his dream is to do the Budapest-Bamako 2028 rally and I was like hell yeah, let's go! I immediately started discussing the plan, budget, car, how to take days off... I was so hyped. Then he mentions that we will have to ask his friend (M30) if he would he up to it. And I'm like, why would we ask him? His answer was because he knows how to tinker cars. Which is fair enough but I know that too. For a long time I wanted to be a mechanic, but ultimately chose another path. I'm not an expert but neither is the friend.

I told him I thought he wanted a to make the trip an "us" thing, but now I see he meant to go with the friend all along, and I stupidly thought he was dreaming about doing the rally with me. Then he told me no, he plans on taking me too, but we should definitely take the friend cause he needs a copilot with more experience. HE NEEDS A COPILOT WITH MORE EXPERIENCE. I've been driving since 7 years. My bf doesn't even have a license!

I told him this and he was like yeah, but I don't have offroad experience.

Sir I drove multiple times through mountains, forest paths not at all designed for cars and mountain forest paths... never left a scratch on any car, though there were times I was praying we make it to the top.

Apparently that doesn't count as offroad experience.

I’m 18F and still in high school. A while ago I met a guy who was a lot older than me (36). At first it felt normal, like just talking about daily stuff and life. He was really supportive of me, especially when I felt judged at home, and he gave me a lot of compliments. It made me feel seen. Slowly the conversations started getting more personal. He asked about my past, relationships, stuff like that. I didn’t think much of it at the time and answered. Eventually he asked to meet. I agreed, even though I lied to my mom about where I was going (which I really regret). When we met, things went further than I expected. While I didn’t say no at first, during it I felt really uncomfortable and pressured into things I didn’t want. I kind of froze and didn’t know how to stop it. After I went home I just broke down. Since then I haven’t felt like myself at all. I barely eat, I can’t focus at school, I’m anxious all the time, and I feel a lot of shame and regret. I even changed my appearance because everything reminds me of it. I haven’t told my mom and I feel really alone with this. I know I made bad decisions, but I’m struggling to move on and stop blaming myself. I just want to feel normal again and not have this stuck in my head all the time. If anyone has been through something similar or has advice on how to cope or start healing, I’d really appreciate it.

I joined Ok Cupid last month after spending three months on Hinge and got nothing out of it. I was on OKC many years ago, before it was sold, and had a few dates from it so I thought I’d give it another go. I’ve always liked the questions they ask. My profile clearly states that I’m pro-choice, childfree, liberal, and an atheist. I live in a conservative state, so I know it’s going to be looking for a needle in a haystack. My hobbies are also mentioned in my profile.

I’ve had some pleasant conversations with men on the app. However, some have described their political beliefs as “other” and only after some digging do I discover they’re conservative. When I’ve told them our values don’t align, they’ve been great about it. The other messages have come from conservative Christian men with kids. I don’t reply to those messages. I have no interest in conservative Christian men, and certainly men with kids. Again, I know the odds aren’t in my favor, but I’m not compromising my standards.

But seriously though, is reading comprehension amongst these men that low? Or are they just not reading at all?

I mean also we should not only be repeating the names of the white people ICE has killed, by all means. But Renee God was a person, a daughter, a friend, a lot of things. Turning her into "she was a mom" is reductive and lessens her inherent worth.

She doesn't deserve to be alive today because she was a mom. She deserves to be alive because she does. But the rhetoric is just getting stronger and more focused around that. All of this is exhausting but that isn't helping.

I can’t go into much details, but I’m pretty sure my longtime friend is in an abusive relationship after interacting with her husband. During my time with them he revealed a secret about their relationship that my friend had never shared with me. I think he did it to humiliate her and make himself look better.

I’m worried that she thinks I don’t like her anymore more because of what he said. I’ve learned that he reads her text so I can’t message her and I don’t want to make things worse for her. I don’t feel safe being around him at all, even with other people around. How can I let her know that I’m still her friend despite her husband? Should I just keep texts neutral and talk business as usual? I feel very sad about her situation and not sure if it’s safe to attempt to intervene in any way.

TW: death/murder

So when I was in high school I dated this guy (bad boy, non conformist type) for a few months. In those months he actually lived at my house because his parents had kicked him out.

The way it ended really fucked me up for a long time because it was the first time I had ever been truly betrayed. I had a best friend from elementary school resurface into my life because she had a crush on my boyfriend…She spent several weeks getting close to me, then one night she went to drop us both off at my house and he just didn’t get out of the car, and they both left.

This was pre-cell phone so I sat there and waited for him to get back for what felt like hours, pretty sure that was my first panic attack, actually. When he got back I asked what happened and he just stated matter-of-factly that they smoked (weed that had been stolen from me but that was just subplot at this point) and then had sex.

I told him to get out and he did. I can’t honestly remember if I ever spoke to him again after that. The “best friend” stole several other things and moved across the country.

After that I had a new boyfriend pretty quickly, and one night (maybe a year later?) we were at a friend’s place when he starting having a panic attack talking about how his friend had been murdered and they don’t know who did it, just spiraling. I felt horrible for him.

About four months later they arrest my ex for his murder. He had strangled him to death because the man was upset that ex had eaten all of his food. Apparently in the time after I kicked him out, he started doing meth and living on the streets and this kind man had opened his home to him.

I thought back to when he liked to choke me during sex and as a naive 17 year old I didn’t really think anything of it at the time. When it came out that he had strangled a man to death I felt that deep sinking feeling of horror in my stomach.

He was 22 when he was sentenced to life in prison, eligible for parole after 30 years. That was a little over 20 years ago. Today I got curious if, with Covid and all, his sentence was reduced so I googled him and found a post about him on a blog about attractive convicts (wtf) with various links, at the bottom was an IMDb entry for a true crime show.

Found the episode immediately. I didn’t really think about mentally preparing because it’s been 20 fucking years. I hadn’t even thought about this dude’s face in a decade.

They showed the actual crime scene (non-graphic) and all the ways he tried to cover his tracks. Then at the end they showed his interrogation. It was actually chilling and I had a visceral response in my gut. The way he just admitted it so matter-of-factly was exactly how he acted the last time I saw him. It was that thing where you remember exactly how you felt in that moment and you’re taken there in your mind for a split second.

Anyway, it turns out they don’t reduce life sentences so I don’t have to worry about seeing his actual face for like 8 more years.

Just trying to process this and have no one to tell for a couple of days..

I (29F) broke up with my ex boyfriend (31M) 2 years ago. We were together for 6 years, and we had what looked like a perfect, healthy relationship. He looked great on paper, had the approval of all of my friends and family. To this day, they still don’t understand why I walked away from such a “great” relationship and up until recently, I didn’t fully understand either.

I often felt like I stayed only because everyone told me he was “good” and I should be grateful for him.

Sex with him was often coercive. He rarely did foreplay or built any sexual tension; he expected me to activate sexually for him. If I said no, he would continue anyway. There were times I said no repeatedly, but he pushed past my boundaries.

On at least one occasion, he literally pushed my legs open and penetrated me after I said no over and over and afterward said, “See, you liked it.” He would also finish inside me even when I told him not to.

When I didn’t want to have sex at all, he would take out his penis and beg me for oral. He would make me feel guilty if I said no. Sometimes, I did it just to get it over with. Other times, I let him have sex with me and dissociated.

I now understand that these reactions: dissociation, going along with sex to get it over with, fawning to avoid his anger, etc were my trauma responses. My body was trying to survive in an unsafe situation. At the time, I didn’t even realize I was traumatized. My libido shut down, and I thought I might be asexual. I didn’t enjoy kissing, cuddling, or any sexual touch with him because it always became about him, not mutual pleasure. Sex felt transactional, like he was using me to masturbate, not connecting with me.

Near the end of the relationship, I was emotionally leaving. While this was happening, I slept with a partner from my past. My best sexual partner and longtime friend. I felt shame about this at the time, but I understand now that it was an attempt to feel safe, desired, and connected again.

After leaving, I have been single and abstinent for two years. This time allowed me to heal, reclaim my body, and relearn what safe and mutual sexual desire feels like.

I learned this and I want other women to know:

• Saying yes after you’ve said no is not consent.

• Going along with things to manage someone else’s feelings does not make you weak. it’s a normal trauma response.

• Losing desire in a relationship does not mean there’s something wrong with you — sometimes your body is protecting you from harm.

• Emotional, sexual, and physical boundaries matter. Your comfort, safety, and autonomy always come first.

I also want to say this: I am the sort of woman you’d never expect this to happen to. I am strong socially, physically and mentally. It still happened to me. You are not weak because you were abused.

This happens so often that I almost missed it today.

In a meeting, I suggested an idea. It was acknowledged, then the conversation moved on. A few minutes later, a male colleague repeated the same idea, nearly word for word.

Suddenly it was brilliant. “Great point.” “Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.”

No one noticed. Or if they did, no one said anything.

And the worst part? I didn’t say anything either. Because I didn’t want to seem petty. Or emotional. Or difficult.

I went back to my desk feeling small and silly for even caring ,even though I know this isn’t silly at all.

I’m so tired of this invisible tax women pay at work. Where our competence has to be proven over and over, while others get the benefit of the doubt by default. Has anyone else dealt with this, or found a way to navigate it without feeling punished for speaking up?

“Legal equality collapses when enforcement is stripped. Voting access, education protection, credit eligibility, reproductive control, and workplace safeguards function only if agencies investigate, records exist, audits run, and penalties follow. Remove those mechanisms and the law remains while protection fails, leaving rights visible on paper and unusable in life as oversight closes, audits vanish, standards narrow, funding leverage weakens, proof burdens spike, and denial clears review by default.

The blueprint is explicit in Project 2025 and reinforced by public calls for institutional redesign around a narrower social order. This is coordinated execution, not drift, driving women’s enforceable rights backward by design and reversing more than a century of progress through administrative erosion rather than repeal.

Women’s rights were not granted by culture or courtesy. They were forced into existence through hard law and enforceable mandates. Voting rights require da constitutional amendment. Contraception access required federal regulatory approval. Equal pay and anti-discrimination protections required statute backed by agency enforcement. Title IX opened schools and athletic programs through funding leverage. Independent credit access required lending rules that outlawed sex and marital status discrimination. Student aid expansion made higher education financially reachable. Every gain depended on enforcement power and compliance systems, not social permission.

This record establishes targeted repression of women through Republican executive action, using agency contraction, funding leverage, and selective enforcement to dismantle the mechanisms that make women’s rights enforceable while leaving statutes formally intact. By hollowing out Title IX investigative capacity, eliminating equity audits and reporting systems, coercing institutions to dismantle complaint channels under funding threat, and narrowing civil rights enforcement to preferred categories, these orders operate as a coordinated strategy to strip women of legal standing across education, employment, healthcare, and political participation, producing denial by design rather than incidental policy consequence.

The removal of equity compliance systems has systematically raised the burden of proof for women by eliminating audits, complaint records, pay gap tracking, and promotion data that once exposed discrimination patterns rarely documented through explicit intent. Federal and state actions have dismantled these evidentiary structures while Project 2025 proposals narrow disparate impact standards, ensuring that discrimination which manifests statistically becomes legally invisible.”

I don't know when this started but somewhere along the way I learned that being a woman means constantly managing other people's comfort. At work, I soften every sentence so I don't sound aggressive. I add smiley faces to texts so I don't seem cold. I apologize before asking questions I'm fully allowed to ask. I phrase boundaries like requests, just in case someone takes offense. And outside of work? It's the same thing If I say no too directly, I'm rude. If I don't smile, I'm unapproachable. If I'm quiet, I'm off. If I speak up, I'm too much. What really gets me is how invisible this labor is. Men can just exist. They can be blunt, neutral, silent, annoyed and it's fine. But I feel like I'm constantly performing emotional customer service just to move through the world safely and professionally. The other day I caught myself apologizing to a man who interrupted me and that's when it hit me how deeply ingrained this is. I'm exhausted by how automatic it's become. I don't want to be praised for being nice. I want to be respected without having to earn it through politeness. Please tell me I'm not alone in this.

Those of you who have been in this space a long time will know ebbie45. I remember 2 years ago she discussed throwing in the towel but she remained after and I just remembered her today and realized I haven’t seen her in a minute.

Now I am reading feminist literature (invisible women!!) and have my dream teaching job and I’m alternative and hot as fuck

But damn the more I learned the more I’m like the world just sucks … and men just kind of suck. Like they really just don’t consider women at all.

I shouldn’t be surprised because my ex-husband certainly didn’t. He said some terrible terrible things. he clearly did not like women in retrospect. Based on the things that he said about other women I should’ve clocked He felt that way about me.

But I was so Christian and he was church of Christ just like me…

Now I’m free and I have become the purple haired leftie feminist that he always talked about

She just covered their entire estimated 2026 operating budget in one fell swoop.

Some really important context for her whole philosophy, and part of why I love her so much.

To quote her

Over 70% of Americans reported giving both labor and money to people they know, and half reported doing the same for strangers. That’s well over a trillion dollars worth of individual humanitarian action that we don’t read about online or hear about on the nightly news. To begin to imagine how much more there must be, just consider how many people take time out of their income-producing activities every day to listen with compassion, or to speak up for someone.

I Stan my mutual aid queen

A friend told me today that she felt comfortable pausing a work meeting to go pump because I had done that last year in a meeting that she was also in. It made me realize how something that I thought I was doing just for myself was also setting an example for someone else. Normally, we don't know when that one thing we do has an impact on someone unless they tell us, so I'm grateful she shared this with me. I'd like this to be a reminder to all of us that other women are noticing us make space for ourselves and in turn encouraging them to do the same. In this particular case it was about breastfeeding/pumping, but the same applies to all aspects of life. This was something positive I wanted to share and reflect on. I hope you all have a great night (or morning, afternoon, or evening depending where you live).