Meredith Sell

The Mother of Feminism Wants You to Get Stronger Mary Wollstonecraft, 18th-century author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, saw physical weakness as part of women’s oppression.

“I wish to persuade women to endeavour to acquire strength, both of mind and body.”
~Mary Wollstonecraft, writing in 1792

womensbarbellclub.substack.com/p/the-mother...

DOGE Put Free Tax Filing Tool on Chopping Block After One Meeting With Lobbyists A key operative from DOGE initiated plans to potentially kill Direct File, the free tax filing tool developed by the IRS, after offering assurances it would be spared from cuts.

SCOOP: DOGE moved to kill Direct File, the IRS's popular free tax filing tool, days after meeting with private tax filing software lobbyists.
www.wired.com/story/doge-d...

Colorful quilt of a nighttime scene with Harriet Tubman in an orange jacket and purple dress carrying a rifle. She is leading other figures who walk behind her.

Harriet Tubman #quilt by my Mom, Vera P. Hall, who makes quilts celebrating Black people who fought for their own freedom. This seems to be the crowd favorite of the “We Didn’t Wait for Freedom” series. Happy #Juneteenth #quilting

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

Rockies Got You Down? Root For the Denver Onyx, Our Unstoppable New Women's Rugby Team Stacked with top talent, the city’s new women’s rugby squad has dominated its competition.

Inexplicably became a rugby fan in the process of writing this story: www.5280.com/denver-onyx-...

I absolutely LOVED @scatterall.bsky.social's biography of Amelia Bloomer. Devoured it and marked so many pages to return to for historical tidbits and other things of interest. Like, who knew Amelia Bloomer introduced Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton to each other?

Ilona Maher Is More than Her Lipstick Can we shine a spotlight on her brain?

Everybody loves Ilona Maher, but her message re: lipstick and femininity leaves much to be desired.

womensbarbellclub.substack.com/p/ilona-mahe...

I really appreciate how you speak with moral clarity. Keep it up.

Taking a few weeks off from Women’s Barbell Club to tackle some deadlines for paid work (including a story on women’s pro rugby) and travel to my little brother’s wedding. But I have soooo many ideas knocking around in my head right now.

report on this yesterday by @dmehro.bsky.social:

This seems to have only been a “protest” in the sense that he appeared personally to conduct an inspection, was denied entry & refused to accept that, which is why members of Congress came, because they can’t be lawfully turned away.

This wasn’t Laura Loomer handcuffing herself to Twitter HQ.

Not a protest -- from earlier in the week leading up to this from NJ reporter ‪@zachblackburn.bsky.social‬: Newark is currently suing operator of the facility for alleged permitting and inspections violations, facility would not admit Mayor and inspectors 3 days ago. bsky.app/profile/zach...

This one drives me nuts too. I don't think I knew that "adviser" was an allowed spelling until my mid-20s, and my brain still refuses to accept it.

as we cruise into Mother's Day weekend, I want to be clear that A PHYSICAL EDUCATION is nothing if not an invitation for all of our Almond Moms to come to the table to perhaps, literally for the first time ever, break some damn bread
womensbarbellclub.substack.com/p/why-casey-...

Why Casey Johnston Loves Lifting A review of her new book, A Physical Education

Fitness writer Casey Johnston's new book, A Physical Education, is out today. Check out our review and join the conversation on strength training:

womensbarbellclub.substack.com/p/why-casey-...

here's a real-deal review of A Physical Education from Women's Barbell Club (the people who would Know) womensbarbellclub.substack.com/p/why-casey-...

Thanks for reading and sharing! Glad this came across your radar.

100 DAYS...of lying, grifting, lawbreaking, division, incompetence, ignorance, illegal deportations, self-aggrandizement, vulgarity, self-pity, cruelty, ignoring the Supreme Court & due process while attacking: the Media, Universities, Law Firms, the Courts & Journalists.

1362 Days to go...

A horrible story but god bless this woman so accurately reading the ICE goons for filth here

I've regretted getting a Pixel since the day after I bought it and the forcing AI onto users is another reason whenever my phone bites the dust, I'm going back to Samsung.

Is it just me or are publications getting way more aggressive with paywalls? I visited a publication's site ONCE and the next time it immediately redirected me to a subscription page — no choice to opt out and return to the story I was looking at.

For a long time, my Roman Empire has been the turn of the century (1880s-1920s), and I gotta say it feels way more relevant these days than anything having to do with Caesar Augustus.

Every day, it looks more like a regime.

Now the Trump administration is pushing to put Columbia University under a consent decree—a court-enforced agreement that would legally bind the school to federal demands, with a judge overseeing whether they “comply.”

Proper gun safety rules are to point the gun at the ground, so yeah, she's definitely not doing it right (info via the hunter's safety course my dad made me take at 13).

This is absolutely appalling.

No tariffs on Russia. Huh?

Trump's tariffs will translate into a 2.3 percentage point increase to overall inflation this year, according to new estimates from the Yale Budget Lab — or about a $3,800 impact for the average household.

Photo of Cory Booker in a black suit and tie

WASHINGTON (AP) — Cory Booker breaks the record for longest Senate speech, previously held by segregationist Strom Thurmond.

I will never, for the life of me, understand why magazines want pitches for FOB pieces of less than 500 words FOUR MONTHS before print time.

I hope Cory Booker is wearing good shoes. My feet hurt just thinking about standing that long.