Sign up for The week in patriarchy, a newsletter​ on feminism and sexism sent every Saturday.

Elizabeth Warren unleashes her inner Cougar

Jacob Wohl is just 21 years old but he has already built a dazzling career for himself as an incompetent fraudster and unhinged conspiracy theorist. He’s been banned from Twitter for operating fake accounts. He’s been charged with securities fraud. He’s admitted to promoting false news to smear Democrats. He’s tried to frame Robert Mueller and Pete Buttigieg for sexual assault. He’s attempted so much crime in such a short time that he’s basically an honorary Trump.

This week, Wohl struck again. And by “struck” I mean “made a complete fool of himself”. On Thursday Wohl and Jack Burkman, another conservative activist, held a “press conference” in which they claimed Elizabeth Warren, 70, paid for the sexual services of a 24-year-old former marine called Kelvin Whelly. “These charges will shock the conscious of the nation,” a media release that went out before the event promised. Yes, that’s right, these geniuses managed to misspell “conscience”.

Standing in front of a big sign emblazoned with the words “Elizabeth Warren Cougar?” on it, the senator’s alleged boytoy kept on cracking up as he read his statement. In between giggles he claimed that he had been hired by Warren from a gigolo agency called Cowboys4Angels for frequent sessions of BDSM. Whelly then took off his shirt to show off a scar he says was the result of Warren whipping him.

I don’t think I need to tell you that Whelly’s story is entirely made-up. However, just in case you had any doubts, the owner and CEO of Cowboys4Angels says Whelly never worked for his agency and was “not up to caliber” to get a job as a gigolo. “I would never even hire that guy,” he told Rolling Stone. An insult which, no doubt, stung far harder than Warren’s imaginary whip ever did.

Warren, incidentally, reacted to the fact that a vile far-right troll has been writing bad erotic fanfic about her in the best, most presidential, way possible.

“It’s always a good day to be reminded that I got where I am because a great education was available for $50 a semester at the University of Houston (go Cougars!),” Warren tweeted on Thursday. “We need to cancel student debt and make college free for everyone who wants it.” This was accompanied with a big picture of the Houston Cougars logo. #Cougar2020 immediately started trending.

Cougars 1; Rightwing trolls 0.

Hello? Police? I’d like to report a murder

It’s not often a 6,700-word piece of literary criticism goes viral. This week, however, everyone has been rightly raving about Patricia Lockwood’s elegant evisceration of John Updike in the London Review of Books. “I was hired as an assassin,” Lockwood begins. “You don’t bring in a 37-year-old woman to review John Updike in the year of our Lord 2019 unless you’re hoping to see blood on the ceiling.” A lot of blood proceeds to hit the ceiling. “No one can seem to agree on [Updike’s] surviving merits,” Lockwood notes. “He wrote like an angel, the consensus goes, except when he was writing like a malfunctioning sex robot attempting to administer cunnilingus to his typewriter.”

Supreme court hears first major abortion case since Kavanaugh confirmed

On Friday, the US supreme court announced it will be reviewing a Louisiana regulation that requires doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital 30 miles away. This requirement severely restricts access to abortion, particularly for low-income women. The supreme court struck down a similar Texas law in 2016. Justice Anthony Kennedy cast the decisive vote in that case; he has now been replaced by Brett Kavanaugh. And we all know how much he cares about women’s rights.

Turkey rules feminist children’s book should be treated like porn

The bestselling Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls book is a collection of stories about extraordinary women from around the world. Which is dangerous stuff according to the Turkish government, which recently ruled that portions of the book “will have a detrimental influence on the minds of those under the age of 18”. This means it can only be sold to adults and has to be hidden from view in bookshops.

‘Women in this class are useless’

A North Carolina physics professor allegedly told students: “I guess the women in this class are useless. Maybe I should call on a man.” Dr. E David Davis later explained this was “a joke”. He has now been suspended, so I guess the joke’s on him.

Over 30% of Japanese women with mental health issues blame workplace harassment

According to a government survey released on Tuesday, 36% of Japanese women with mental illnesses said it was caused by some form of harassment at work. As CNN reports, “Japan remains a male-dominated society and … is ranked 110 out of 149 countries in the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) latest global gender gap index.”

Praise be, we finally know what The Handmaid’s Tale is about

A Canadian couple recently made the somewhat bizarre choice of incorporating a Handmaid’s Tale-themed wedding photo into their nuptials. Nothing says “eternal love”, after all, like a picture of the happy couple kissing in front of a “hanging wall” surrounded by Handmaids who are raped and forced to bear children. Anyway, the photo circulated online this week and sparked predictable outrage. Now the photographers have weighed in to say the photo was not tasteless and weird, it was actually meant to “wake people up” about the “oppression” in Margaret Atwood’s novel. Really brave of them to wake people up like this. I don’t know about you but until I saw that photo I was laboring under the delusion that the Handmaid’s Tale was a quirky romcom featuring a strong female lead.