Last week, New York Magazine’s The Cut published an all-time banger of a hate read — which is saying something, considering the run they’ve been on recently (from the “$50k in a shoebox” piece to the “tried to leave my husband and then realized I was just having a breakdown” piece). Grazie Sophia Christie’s floridly written and smugly framed essay, “The Case for Marrying an Older Man,” argues, with all the wisdom and certainty earned through 27 years on earth and 4 years of marriage, that leveraging youth and beauty to marry an older man is a cheat code for women, who are otherwise condemned to years of miserable labor alongside insufficient same-age partners. In her case, as she contends, it seems like a lucky jackpot: her husband, a handsome French count just 10 years older than her, is wealthy and came into the relationship mid-career, with a thrice-weekly housecleaner and polished manners. Basically, she’s figured out that marrying a rich man can come with some material benefits.

It’s little wonder this opus, despite its unoriginal thesis, ignited an old-school Twitter discourse cycle. Feminism is in a time of struggle and retrenchment, while women jaded by its failures have begun to succumb to the nostalgic appeal of traditional gender roles. Trad wifery is on the rise. Hot girls are craving a soft life and romanticizing everything. For all its faults, Christie’s essay has its finger firmly on the pulse.

So we decided to talk through what the piece argues explicitly and what it signals implicitly, what feelings it brought up in us, what it signals about the state of women’s progress, and what a feminist movement should offer as an alternative to everyone giving up and trying to marry the richest men we can. And like the original essay, our conversation ended up being far less about age gaps than it was about class, gender politics, and the costs of tying women’s worth to their youth… while they have it. We also referenced a couple fellow Substackers’ thought-provoking responses to the essay: B.D. McClay’s “Here’s the deal” and Kelly Johnson’s “On being a woman in America.” Hope you enjoy! xo

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