Megan Garber

Good Riddance to the Handshake

A terrible custom is gone for good. Hallelujah.

• Megan Garber
• May 11, 2020

How Uncertainty Became a Weapon in the Tara Reade Story

The treatment of her sexual-assault claim about Joe Biden has revealed a cultural impulse to take refuge in easy absolutes.

• Megan Garber
• May 5, 2020

Groundhog Day Was a Horror Movie All Along

The 1993 existential comedy has become a meme and a metaphor for this moment. But that’s only partly because of its exploration of monotony.

• Megan Garber
• April 30, 2020

Trump Is Building a Dystopia in Real Time

Every day, the president’s coronavirus briefings broadcast an alarming argument: that public health is best understood as a matter of PR.

• Megan Garber
• April 24, 2020

The Perfect Quarantine Joke Is Not About Quarantine

Comedy, the adage goes, is tragedy plus time. But in this pandemic, even humor has no idea what the future holds.

• Megan Garber
• April 2, 2020

Homes Actually Need to Be Practical Now

One of the ironies of social distancing is that it can put privacy in short supply.

• Megan Garber
• March 29, 2020

The Utter Weirdness of Small Talk in a Pandemic

Pleasantries amid a global health crisis are woefully insufficient. They are also what we have.

• Megan Garber
• March 19, 2020

The Problem of the Pandemic Movie

The 1995 film Outbreak offers a narrow vision of heroism during an epidemiological crisis. That message is ill-suited to the realities of the coronavirus.

• Megan Garber
• March 16, 2020

How Hillary Clinton Became a Postmodern Menace

The former presidential candidate is in the news again. Why do some find that so troubling?

• Megan Garber
• March 12, 2020

Sexism Is Other People

‘Electability.’ ‘Likability.’ ‘Authenticity.’ The 2020 Democratic primary has found many canny ways to make misogyny plausibly deniable.

• Megan Garber
• March 8, 2020

The American President, for the Foreseeable Future, Will Be a Man

That’s it. That’s the story.

• Megan Garber
• March 5, 2020

America Punished Elizabeth Warren for Her Competence

The country still doesn’t know what to make of a woman—in politics, and beyond—who refuses to qualify her success.

• Megan Garber
• March 5, 2020

‘Alleged’ No Longer

Harvey Weinstein was tried over the past two months. So were regressive ideas about what sexual violence really looks like.

• Megan Garber
• February 25, 2020

Whistleblower: When a Memoir Is Also an Indictment

The book from the former Uber engineer Susan Fowler is an intimate first-person account that doubles as a warning.

• Megan Garber
• February 23, 2020

The Weinstein Trial and the Lies of Due Process

The constitutional term may be rooted in reason. In practice, it can look a lot uglier.

• Megan Garber
• February 8, 2020

Boredom Is Winning

The impeachment trial of Donald Trump is merely the latest reminder: American politics has become uncomfortably numb.

• Megan Garber
• February 5, 2020

Harvey Weinstein’s Pain

As his criminal trial begins, the mogul seems to believe that the language of pain used by his accusers applies just as readily to himself.

• Megan Garber
• January 22, 2020

Gwyneth Paltrow’s Netflix Show Is Painful to Watch

The streaming service has turned the star’s controversial e-commerce brand into a series. Soft-lit chaos ensues.

• Megan Garber
• January 18, 2020

Harvey Weinstein Haunted the Golden Globes

The glittering ceremony took place on the eve of the Hollywood mogul’s criminal trial. You wouldn’t have known that from watching the show.

• Megan Garber
• January 6, 2020

The Most Powerful Scene in Bombshell

And why it’s not enough

• Megan Garber
• December 23, 2019