
Trad wives are having a moment. A new conservative women’s magazine promising to be the anti-Cosmo is capitalizing on the trend.
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Sarah Peterson
If you are a woman on God's green earth on Al Gore's Internet, then your algorithm has at some point served you. Nara Smith, the soft spoken model who loves to cook for her husband and kids.
E.J. Dixon
My toddlers were playing in the backyard. They asked me for a Capri Sun. Since I had all the fruit at home to make some, I told them to give me a minute.
Sarah Peterson
Nara's Capri sun doesn't have any added sugar or citric acid or any of those sus natural flavors that are in the store bought one. It's all from scratch.
E.J. Dixon
I also added some cold grapes and it was time to start juicing all of my fruit.
Sarah Peterson
But then she does put it in the little plastic pouch with the straw just like it's a real Capri sun, which is incredibly cute. And now Somehow you've lost 10 minutes and there are hundreds more of these videos and really you need to get offline and go do something with yourself. But you cannot look away. What is happening to you? You have entered the world of tradwives. They are coming up on Today.
E.J. Dixon
Explained right as I was done cleaning up, they wanted a second one.
Victoria Chamberlain
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E.J. Dixon
But.
Victoria Chamberlain
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Aria Lewis
Learn what Amazon Q Business can do.
Victoria Chamberlain
For you@aws.com learnmore that's aws.com learnmore to.
Aria Lewis
Explain.
Sarah Peterson
Sarah Peterson, author of Mom Fluenced and the Substack in Pursuit of Clean Countertops what is a trad wife?
Aria Lewis
So I would define a trad wife. My definition has kind of changed in the last couple years, but I would define a trad wife as somebody who adheres to traditional gender norms and does so in a public facing way. First of all, you should be a mother. If you're a woman, you should be a mother and you should glory in all things domestic. So not only should you take care of the house Clean the house, cook the meals, raise the children. Ideally, you're doing these things in a really aesthetically pleasing way. Often they homeschool their children. They're often making food from scratch. So they're doing all things, you know, mothering labor and domestic labor, but they're turning it up to 100.
E.J. Dixon
I submit and I serve my husband. And the Bible has the man of the household, not the woman. This morning, my toddlers really wanted to.
Aria Lewis
Color, but we were all out of.
E.J. Dixon
Paper, so I decided to make my own.
Aria Lewis
There's a lot of disillusionment, rightly so, with sort of, you know, the narratives of mainstream feminism that have been parceled out in, you know, the past 20 years.
Victoria Chamberlain
Lean in.
Aria Lewis
So there's a real rejection of girl boss feminism at the heart of many of these accounts. There's a lot of exhaustion with the idea of having to work a full time job in addition to raising a family without getting burnt out. You know, there's a lot of women who, you know, I wouldn't necessarily put in the trad wife bucket who are also sort of united in this rejection of the version of feminism that they've been fed. There's soft girls who are living soft lives.
Sarah Peterson
Spend a day with me as a girl that prefers to live a softer life.
E.J. Dixon
Strong black woman narrative. It doesn't apply to me. I live a soft life.
Sarah Peterson
I just want a soft life. Very soft, as soft as it can get.
Aria Lewis
And then I'm thinking of the stay at home girlfriend phenomenon. And these women really prioritize keeping their homes immaculate, keeping their bodies immaculate. A lot of focus on physical appearance, maintaining beauty standards and body standards. And I'm thinking of one Kendall K on TikTok day of my life as.
E.J. Dixon
A stay at home girlfriend. I first did my skincare routine, then I did some ice rolling and some journaling, and I made the bed.
Aria Lewis
It's really simple, content usually, but I think the appeal is that it feels simple and it feels sort of separate from the messiness of life that most of us are experiencing. So, yeah.
Sarah Peterson
So is the word trad wife, Is it something that this group of women embraces? Like, is it offensive if I call a woman a trad wife?
Aria Lewis
It depends. Which I know is an obnoxious answer, but I'm thinking of one who, like, proudly wears the term aria Lewis. She's Mrs. Aria Lewis on Instagram, and she is constantly defining what it means to be a trad wife. Owning the term trad wife, being traditional.
E.J. Dixon
Is not a 1950s cosplay cult or a Little House on the Prairie cosplay cult. Being traditional is having a set of values that you make your life decisions from.
Aria Lewis
But then you have people like Hannah Neeleman, who was interviewed by the London Times and said she didn't really identify with the term. I think a lot of the time these women are saying they're just living their lives. And, you know, we're the ones that are obsessed with labeling it and sort of pathologizing it, but they're just doing what feels right to them.
Sarah Peterson
Hannah Nealman is fascinating. Tell us about her.
Aria Lewis
I started following Hannah Neeleman in 2019 or 2020. I wrote a piece for Harper's Bazaar, and at that point she had under 200,000 followers on Instagram, which is absolutely wild considering she now has roughly 22 million followers across all platforms. She has just absolutely exploded in fame and just visibility. She is a mother of eight. She's Mormon. She lives on a ranch in Utah with her husband, Daniel Neeleman, who is one of the children of David Neeleman, who founded JetBlue. So there's certainly generational wealth at play. Yeah, they are hugely controversial, mostly because Hannah's Instagram makes her life look really serene. I would say she just leans into motherhood and domesticity in a way that feels absolutely impossible unless you have a ton of money and a ton of other privileges. I think a Hallmark Hannah Nealman reel is her cooking some sort of elaborate scratch meal. I'm getting started on my meat, so I put tons of herbs, bread crumbs, some spices, and then I put it in a loaf pan and baked that. Then while that was baking, I rolled out my sourdough pita. And pita is literally so easy to make. And she's got a. She's either wearing a baby or has a toddler on her hip. Children are coming in and out of frame. And her voice, it never really changes in pitch or tone. It's like, always calm.
E.J. Dixon
I wake up Nurse Lord Jo.
Aria Lewis
Then we get the kids fed and ready for school, which is in a little schoolhouse we have here on the farm. And I think if you were to ask most people, like, do you follow any trad wives? The one they would reference the most.
Sarah Peterson
Is Hannah Naleman producer Victoria Chamberlain, notably not a trad wife. She buys French salt from Ballerina Farm, and then she posts images on our work Slack. She loves the content. She watches it on Instagram. I do, too. I don't want to be a trad wife. Why do I want to watch it so much? Why do we want to buy the salt. Like, what is the allure here?
Aria Lewis
It's really beautiful content. A lot of the time, you know, there's all these rolling hills, you know, open plains. The kitchen is rustic in this very like, you know, yesteryear type of way. And I think there's something so intoxicating about the idea of devoting oneself to just to one thing or to go all in on one aspect of your identity. I think that's especially salient for moms who, you know, we can't find affordable childcare. We're constantly torn in two directions. And so to see somebody who isn't torn in two directions and who seems really happy and is living this beautiful life, yeah, I think we all just want more, more simplicity. And I think we're also longing for the certainty that she seems to have in her lifestyle.
Sarah Peterson
You said she was controversial. What makes her controversial?
Aria Lewis
Um, really that she's adhering to super specific standards of femininity and motherhood. She's very thin, she's conventionally attractive. She even, you know, she participates in beauty pageants, which is just, you know, an explicit, like, best domestic goddess contest. And I think mothers across this country are mad. We're exhausted, we're under resourced, we're not supported by our government. And so to see somebody constantly selling this idyllic, romanticized version of motherhood that is wildly impossible for the vast majority of people feels sort of like a.
Sarah Peterson
Form of gaslighting, I think a defender of Hannah Neelman might say. But she's not doing anything bad. She and other women like her are just living their best lives, however, realistically, on Instagram. And that's not a real problem. And if that's a real problem, then anybody who pretends their life is better than it is on social media is a problem.
Aria Lewis
I don't even care. I'm not even particularly interested in whether or not, you know, all of this comes as easily to her as she makes it seem. I do think Hannah Neeleman has her responsibility in the trad wife sort of phenomenon is hard to parse. I think what's more important is what politicians do with tradwives and how they, you know, explicitly or not weaponize them in the culture wars. While she has said that she aims to be apolitical for most of her public facing years, she recently did a cover shoot with Evie magazine. It looks a lot like Glamour or Elle, but they're publishing articles about, you know, the toxicity of birth control and the importance of the nuclear family and how to be your best feminine self. And they were really big supporters of Donald Trump, so I don't think she can claim an apolitical stance anymore. I think if we weren't living in this really broken, you know, country where women's rights are just this, like, you know, constant object of debate, I don't think she would be quite the lightning rod. She is.
Sarah Peterson
Sarah Peterson momfluenced is the book, and in pursuit of clean Countertops is the substack. Coming up, Evie Magazine Cosmo for conservatives what's the sex column like? We're going to get into it.
Victoria Chamberlain
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Sarah Peterson
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Victoria Chamberlain
This is Today Explained.
E.J. Dixon
My name is E.J. dixon and I am a senior writer at New York magazine's the Cut.
Sarah Peterson
Tell me about Evie Magazine.
E.J. Dixon
Evie magazine is a magazine that was started by a model named Brittany Martinez that was sort of branded as like the Gen Z right wing version of Cosmo. And the mission was basically stemming from her frustration with the fact that most women's magazines are left leaning. You know, they're too permissive about premarital sex. For years, women have been sold this lie by progressive media sources. Go sleep around, do hookup culture, don't worry about family and kids, all this stuff.
Sarah Peterson
And now like women are more miserable than ever.
E.J. Dixon
So she wanted to come up with an alternative for Conservative women aged 18 to 35, approximately. We're never going to encourage orgies or cheating on your spouse or whatever that.
Aria Lewis
Women'S magazines have talked about for decades.
E.J. Dixon
So we are counterculture in that way. She wrote an op ed for this. I would categorize it as a right leaning website, Quillette. And she sort of said that the mission was to, quote, empower, educate and entertain young women with content that celebrates femininity, encourages virtue, and offers a more honest perspective than they get elsewhere. She's classier than cosmo, sexier than Refinery29, and smarter than Bustle.
Sarah Peterson
And I immediately know what that means.
E.J. Dixon
Like at first glance, it really looks like a lot of content that you would find geared toward Gen Z women. Like the main story on the homepage right now is an SEO story about how much money Mariah Carey makes every year from All I Want for Christmas Is yous. And like, I bet it's, I bet it's doing good traffic because like people are probably searching that this time of year 10 romantic Christmas, holiday ideas, best accessories, new feminine fragrances to try. And so it's all like, none of that really seems conservative outright, but it's really when you scroll down that you kind of see these articles that are really buried, that are more insidious. Like it's a very obvious pro Trump conservative slant, but it's sort of buried amongst the more innocuous, like apolitical pieces that you find on there.
Sarah Peterson
Can I tell you about one that I found fascinating sure. So it was a first person article. It was titled, we had sex in a car with strangers zooming by. And it was the most thrilling quickie of my life. Did you read that one?
E.J. Dixon
I did not.
Sarah Peterson
Okay, so this woman is newly married, she's on her honeymoon, she's wearing a bikini. Hubby was shirtless, aviators on, and the humidity had his glistening. So she's totally into him.
Aria Lewis
Suddenly, he hit the hazard lights and pulled over.
Sarah Peterson
My heart instantly raced. I knew exactly what was coming. And then they proceed to have sex in the car. But here's the thing. After the first paragraph where you're hooked, you're like, I'm going to hear this wild tale of this sexy time. There is a disclaimer that says, this is educational material for married women only. It made me think, what exactly are you trying to do with this disclaimer? First of all, is Evie magazine serious? Am I really supposed to avert my eyes from the sexy tale because I'm an unmarried woman? Like, what do you think that's trying to say there? And who is it for?
E.J. Dixon
Yeah, you know, when you were initially describing the angle to me, I was like, huh, that doesn't sound like something that they would run. But then when you mentioned that the woman had just gotten married and she was this was on her honeymoon, I was like, oh, okay, that makes sense. So, yeah, it makes perfect sense that they would run that disclaimer. They are very, and they have been basically since their genesis, very aggressively anti premarital sex. They sort of adhere to this very old fashioned line of thinking that, like, sex is for after marriage, sex is for someone you love. And if you have sex before marriage, that you're, you know, somehow spoiled or tainted in some way, and men, and it's always men, then men won't find you, won't be interested in you anymore. And I think they're serious as a heart attack, honestly. I think they're trying to make money. I think they're trying to capitalize on what they believe to be and correctly, I think, believed to be an untapped audience. But I also think they genuinely believe a lot of the stuff that they're writing. I mean, you look no further than, like the people who you see contributing. Like, I remember when I was trying to reach out to writers, when I was reporting the piece out, there were all these names, like, when I looked at people on LinkedIn, these were people with ties to Prageru, which is this conservative digital media behemoth. These were people who, you know, attended Hillsdale College, which is this private Christian college in Michigan with strong ties to the Trump administration. Like, these were like, one of the contributors early on was like the conservative influencer Abby Shapiro, who's the sister of the Daily Wire founder Ben Shapiro, except she was going by her married name, them Abby Roth. I mean, you really only need to look at, like, the people who have invested in EV adjacent enterprises, like the natural family planning app that Brittany Martinez launched to know that they're serious. Brittany Martinez is also the founder of this planning app called 28, which launched in August 2022. And it's basically this wellness app that encourages people to adopt natural family planning methods and offers like, personalized fitness and nutrition recommendations based on where a user is in their cycle. Which kind of sounds like innocuous and apolitical on the surface, but it's actually like the anti birth control argument is like, a pretty strong talking point on the right. I don't think that birth control is moral.
Sarah Peterson
I think that there are a lot.
Aria Lewis
Of other better, healthier methods that are.
Sarah Peterson
Good for your body and don't introduce.
Aria Lewis
Hormones into your body.
E.J. Dixon
Actually, when Evie, you know, in the first year or two that Yvie was running, there were a lot of stories that were, like, very broadly skeptical of birth control in general. These are headlines like, the birth control pill could increase your risk for breast cancer. 13 reasons why you should quit hormonal birth control. And it didn't disclose the relationship between EV Magazine and 28. So obviously there's sort of an inherent conflict of interest there. And 28 had Conservative backing. It had $3 million in backing from Peter Thiel, who's the right wing billionaire who served on Trump's transition committee. And she's denied that he has any involvement with EV in general. But it really, it does raise questions, especially since 28 was initially branded as, like, 28 by Yvie, and the URL for 28 initially redirected to Evie. Like, it does raise questions about, like, what the agenda is here.
Sarah Peterson
I think in the past couple of years, there's definitely been a reckoning about the kinds of magazines that women were sold for many years. Things like Cosmo. Right. And we're looking back and we're like, was Cosmo good for women? And I think the answers are mixed. Right? And so what I'm wondering about is, like, I was like, I was like a Cosmo girl in, like, the early 2000s and whatnot. I was reading about how to, like, make an appletini. And I do wonder in 2024, we've got this magazine that is very popular, that appeals to be growing, that is selling a very different story about what it means to be a woman. And I'll use one of their kind of lines that I read repeatedly, which is, it's great to be feminine. It's not great to be feminist. And I'm just wondering if you think Evie magazine tells us something about the time that we're living in, in the way that I think Cosmo really did tell us something about where we were 20 years ago.
E.J. Dixon
I do. And this is sort of where my feelings about EV Magazine get a little bit more complicated, because I think everything that you're saying is, like, totally spot on. Like, I do think I came of age in the early 2000s, where I was being inundated with how to give a good blowjob listicles, but also told that I shouldn't dress too sexy and.
Sarah Peterson
Be very, very thin.
E.J. Dixon
Yeah, exactly. And a really bad time in retrospect for young women. And I do think that this idea that young women, these very conflicting messages that young women got about being sexual were really harmful and continue to do harm to this day. And I do think that there is a need for a corrective to that, and there is a need for a conversation about how, like, well, women were sold a false bill of goods to some extent. You know, we were told we could have it all. We were told we could have great sex lives and have these amazing careers and, like, have these families. And now, as millennials are coming of age, we're sort of slowly realizing that, no, like, that's. That's. This is actually not possible in this country. Like, it's really, really hard to have even one of those things. And we feel like we've been sold a false bill of goods. So I think they're really tapping into that. Whether or not I agree with it as a blanket statement, like, obviously, I don't, but I think the. Like, I don't think it needs to be either. Or, you know, like, I don't think it needs to be so black and white as to say, well, casual sex is good for women or casual sex is bad for women. I think the real the truth is somewhere in the middle. But I will say I do give them credit for sort of trying to carve out a space in the conversation. E.J.
Sarah Peterson
Dixon of New York magazine's the Cut. Victoria Chamberlain produced today's show. Amina El Saadi edited. Senior researcher Laura Bullard has some questions for you, Evie. Andrea Christensdotter and Rob Byers are our engineers and I'm Noel King. It's Today Explained.
Victoria Chamberlain
Support for this episode comes from aws. AWS Generative AI gives you the tools to power your business forward with the security and speed of the world's Most experienced cloud 2025 is going to be a huge year for the tech industry. AI is either going to take over or maybe kind of start to go away. Regulation is going to continue and change the tech industry, or maybe a new president is going to change his mind about how all that is supposed to work. We're going to get new gadgets and new apps and new social platforms competing for our time and attention, and new information about what it means to be a person on the Internet and how we should be thinking about that. We have no idea what's coming next year, but on the Vergecast this month we've decided to speculate wildly. Anyway, we're spending our time trying to figure out what's coming next year, what isn't, and what it all means. All that on the Vergecast presented by Polestar. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.
Today, Explained: Trad Wife Takeover – Episode Summary
Release Date: December 13, 2024
Host/Author: Vox
Hosts: Sean Rameswaram and Noel King
In this episode of Today, Explained, hosts Sean Rameswaram and Noel King delve into the rising trend of "trad wives"—women who embrace traditional gender roles and domesticity in a modern context. The discussion explores the allure, criticisms, and cultural implications of this movement, offering listeners a comprehensive understanding of its impact on contemporary society.
Aria Lewis offers a foundational definition of what constitutes a trad wife:
"A trad wife is somebody who adheres to traditional gender norms and does so in a public facing way... You should be a mother and you should glory in all things domestic... Ideally, you're doing these things in a really aesthetically pleasing way."
(02:21)
This definition emphasizes the commitment to motherhood, homemaking, and maintaining a certain aesthetic, often showcased through social media platforms.
The episode spotlights influencers like Hannah Neeleman, whose Instagram presence has catapulted her into a trad wife icon. Aria Lewis discusses Hannah's rise to fame:
"She is a mother of eight... Her Instagram makes her life look really serene... she leans into motherhood and domesticity in a way that feels absolutely impossible unless you have a ton of money and a ton of other privileges."
(06:23)
Hannah’s portrayal of an idyllic domestic life has garnered millions of followers, sparking both admiration and controversy.
Aria Lewis explores why the trad wife lifestyle resonates with many women:
"There's something so intoxicating about the idea of devoting oneself to just one thing... moms... constantly torn in two directions... to see somebody who isn't torn in two directions and who seems really happy..."
(08:34)
The appeal lies in the simplicity and certainty that the trad wife lifestyle seemingly offers, providing a stark contrast to the chaotic demands of modern life.
The episode does not shy away from addressing the criticisms of the trad wife movement. Aria Lewis points out the unrealistic standards set by influencers like Hannah Neeleman:
"She's adhering to super specific standards of femininity and motherhood... participating in beauty pageants... It's like the best domestic goddess contest."
(10:00)
Critics argue that such portrayals create unattainable benchmarks for ordinary women, exacerbating feelings of inadequacy and exhaustion among mothers who lack similar resources.
The discussion shifts to the intersection of trad wives with politics and culture wars. Aria Lewis highlights how politicians may leverage the trad wife phenomenon:
"What politicians do with trad wives and how they, you know, explicitly or not weaponize them in the culture wars."
(11:11)
Figures like Hannah Neeleman, despite claiming to be apolitical, inadvertently become symbols in broader political narratives, especially when aligned with conservative values.
A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to analyzing Evie Magazine, a conservative alternative to mainstream women's publications. E.J. Dixon provides an in-depth look:
"Evie magazine is branded as the Gen Z right wing version of Cosmo... empowering, educating and entertaining young women with content that celebrates femininity, encourages virtue..."
(16:17)
Evie aims to offer content that aligns with conservative values, differentiating itself from the perceived liberal slant of traditional magazines.
Sean and Noel draw parallels between Evie Magazine and earlier publications like Cosmopolitan, questioning the evolving narratives around womanhood:
"It's great to be feminine. It's not great to be feminist."
(23:25)
This sentiment reflects a broader societal shift, where femininity is valorized over feminist ideals, echoing debates about women's roles in modern society.
E.J. Dixon reflects on the mixed legacy of magazines like Cosmo and the current rise of outlets like Evie:
"There is a need for a corrective to that, and there is a need for a conversation about how, like, well, women were sold a false bill of goods to some extent."
(24:26)
The episode concludes by acknowledging the complexity of navigating traditional roles in a contemporary context, emphasizing the importance of balanced conversations around femininity, feminism, and personal choice.
Aria Lewis [02:21]: "A trad wife is somebody who adheres to traditional gender norms and does so in a public facing way..."
E.J. Dixon [03:08]: "I submit and I serve my husband. And the Bible has the man of the household, not the woman."
Aria Lewis [05:33]: "Mrs. Aria Lewis on Instagram, and she is constantly defining what it means to be a trad wife."
E.J. Dixon [10:00]: "She's adhering to super specific standards of femininity and motherhood. She's very thin, she's conventionally attractive."
Aria Lewis [11:11]: "What politicians do with trad wives and how they, you know, explicitly or not weaponize them in the culture wars."
Sarah Peterson [24:26]: "We were told we could have it all. We were told we could have great sex lives and have these amazing careers and, like, have these families."
This episode of Today, Explained offers a nuanced exploration of the trad wife movement, dissecting its origins, societal impact, and the controversies it engenders. Through insightful discussions and expert analyses, Sean Rameswaram and Noel King provide listeners with a thorough understanding of how traditional gender roles are being reinterpreted and contested in the modern age.