Noah Berlatsky

Noah Berlatsky

Bio

Noah Berlatsky is a contributing writer for The Atlantic. He edits the online comics-and-culture website The Hooded Utilitarian and is the author of the forthcoming book Wonder Woman: Bondage and Feminism in the Marston/Peter Comics, 1941-1948.

Noah Berlatsky Articles

Credit: The Mary Sue

Comic Heroine Ms. Marvel Fights Islamophobia On Streets Of San Francisco

Bus ads comparing Muslims to Hitler have been replaced with images of a superhero. And not just any superhero.

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Ex Machina Promotional

The Castrating Power Of The Femme Fatale: Ex Machina

Their sexuality traps and destroys male innocence, as they grad hold, by the penis- the better to lead him to castration. Make no mistake that castration is greeted with fear, terror, and disgust—but also with glee. Women as super villains allow their characters to be super powerful; a force for evil is at least a force. In a media landscape where women are often rendered secondary, invisible, and passive, the femme fatale, in her icy violence, seizes female agency along with the phallus that she so efficiently cuts off.

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The Female Man And Its Disdain For Femininity

Feminist dystopia at its finest. Joanna Russ imagines a world in which the elimination of gender hierarchy leads to freedom, strength, and power.

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Pretty Woman At 25: Still A Crass, Degrading Power Fantasy

The rom-com's worshipping of power and wealth comes with a gender twist.

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Image: Getty

Big Bad Choice Words: Salon Calls Nicki Minaj's Rant "Savage" 

"The look on Miley's face during Nicki Minaj's savage, expletive-laden rant says it all," Salon tweeted the day after the VMAs. Less than 140 characters, but still enough to link a black woman to a longstanding racial slur.

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Why Progressives Need Conservatism To Save The Church

Conservative fetishization of the past is myopic, simplistic, and mean-spirited—but progressives can be too quick to cede tradition.

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Courtesy of Wikipedia.org

Is Childbearing Actually Oppressive?

"Childbearing [is] barbaric and pregnancy should be abolished," wrote radical feminist theorist Shulamith Firestone in The Dialectic of Sex.

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Credit: ThinkStock

For Anti-Sex Work Writers, Sex Sells 

Hating sex workers—and treating them as things—can get you money.

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Image: Flickr

A Love Letter To The Original Movie, The Transporter 

Action movies don't usually bother much with romance. The trailer for The Transporter: Refueled certainly doesn't. The hero is cool — sexy women, plural, throw themselves at him, or at least stand near him and things blow up; there are fights and revenge and high production values. Romance is, at best, a secondary concern.

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