The Indignities of Being a Woman

By: Merrill Markoe, Megan Koester

It’s the 21st Century. Why the hell are women - 51% of the population - being treated like second class citizens?

The Indignities of Being a Woman candidly traces the history of womanhood and investigates how much things have really changed for womankind. By carefully x-raying areas such as body image, marriage, mental illness, fashion, and politics, this audiobook examines what it was like to be a woman in the past versus what it’s like now, when women are constantly told equality between the sexes exists but reality proves otherwise.

It’s the brainchild of two childless comedians, Merrill Markoe and Megan Koester. Markoe is a multi-award-winning comedy writer whose credits span television, magazines, and books. She has four Emmy Awards, one for each of her dogs. Koester has written for VICE, Jezebel and the Guardian and has one basic cable acting credit. The two writers—one a comedy veteran, the other an emerging talent—intersperse their dry wit with their own experiences of being long-suffering feminists in the modern world.

Chapter 1: Inequality
Chapter 2: Beauty
Chapter 3: Sex
Chapter 4: Religion
Chapter 5: Marriage and Family
Chapter 6: Body Image
Chapter 7: Crime
Chapter 8: Fashion
Chapter 9: Hair
Chapter 10: Medicine
Chapter 11: Entertainment
Chapter 12: Politics

©2018 Audible Originals, LLC (P)2018 Audible Originals, LLC

Yaaaassss Queens

Can't shout out my love of this book enough (mostly because my husband may hear me and chastise me for my loudness of volume). A hilarious and horrifying trip through time. Please make more of this series. I will buy them all. I will force "allies" to listen to them. And I will quiz them relentlessly. As a former stand-up comic and current talent agent (and lawyer), I could 100% relate to the entertainment industry section. Nothing like being mansplained my job by some dude half my age with a tenth of my education and life experience. There is nothing about this I didn't love. Except putting the laundry away. The songs were great, the idea of putting laundry away, not so much.

Amusing and insightful

The idea for this book came about when the authors wondered why half of the population got the shaft and decided to find out why. Through chapters covering areas like hair, crime, and marriage they tell us what they found in an amusing and insightful way.

all funny, all true

i loved this. couldn't turn it off and its so funny and so tongue in cheek

Preaching to the choir?

So, I liked this book a lot. However, some things about it seemed unnecessarily vulgar - I would have loved to recommend this to my mom, but the amount of swearing and other profanity is holding me back, and this is too bad, as it was really not integral to the story. Similarly, some parts are very partisan sounding. So, if you aren't a woman who is already outraged, you would absolutely hate this book. I thought that was a missed opportunity to try and reach a broader audience and maybe help to educate. Again, some minor changes in the comedy of the intro sections would have made this entirely possible. As an indignant woman, even I had to take this listen in smaller chunks.

Can we force Trump to listen to this????

INCREDIBLE!!! Great research and information. The writing and performance are so outstanding that I’m behind on everything because I’m just driving around town so I can keep listening. If Trump isn’t impeached he should be tied down and made to listen to this. Too bad he doesn’t have the attention span for it.
P. S. The crazy song is an ear worm that I now sing when I’m running!

This should be required for all women under 40

I had to listen to this in small chunks because if I listened too long a time I would become enraged. This is a critical reminder of why it’s important to advocate for ALL women’s rights ALL THE TIME - because since time began its been all about the men.
Merrill is terrific and the stronger of the two readers. But this is an important work in a terrible time for women.

Disturbing but good...

Great take on a very broad subject.(no pun intended) As entertaining as it was nformative. Could have ramped up the marital rape coverage though. :)

Interesting and Funny

This was an interesting read. I thought it was just a humorous look at issues facing women, but it was a well researched look at how women were treated throughput history. It was told in a humorous way, and had a funny song throughout. And if you are a Trump supporter, you probably want to skip this.

Wonder Women through the Ages

I had to listen to this several times because there is just so much good information. Add humor for such a difficult subject helps get through some of the ugliest stuff. Colorful language also underscores how far women have come in just a short 45 or 5000 years and still have much further to go.

full of interesting info and stupid jokes

I wish i had read the reviews before listening. For each interesting historical tidbit, there's a few minutes of podcast style commentary and dated, jokes obsessing over and centering this book around Trump Trump Trump. If I wanted another damn book about Trump I'd finish listening to Comey's or Wolfs or Maddows anti Trump books. Really detracts from the good content