The Gist

Lights, Camera, Sexism

The 24-hour news cycle born in the 1990s was especially unkind to women.

Monica Lewinsky leaves a courthouse in Ellicott City, Maryland on Dec. 16, 1999 after testifying in the Linda Tripp wiretapping trial.

Manny Ceneta/AFP/Getty Images

Listen to Episode 1,042 of Slate’s The Gist:

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On The Gist, let’s imagine what’s in that “enhanced” Michael Cohen tape.

Born in the 1990s, the 24-hour news cycle was especially unkind to women. The media of the age consistently bashed women’s sexuality, ambition, and presentation of women such as Monica Lewinsky and Nancy Kerrigan (case in point: a Washington Post article that asked, “Is Nancy a bitch?”). Journalist Allison Yarrow explores this double-standard and its repercussions in her new book, 90s Bitch: Media, Culture, and the Failed Promise of Gender Equality.

In the Spiel, that was an interesting interview, right? To go with it, Mike pulls statistics on the plight of American women in the ’90s compared with the ’80s.

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Twitter: @slategist

Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Pierre Bienaimé.