Where are all the women — podcaster edition

Why aren't there any female podcasters?! Surely there's a market?

We had yet another real-life “Where are all the women?” encounter yesterday, when an X user named Michelle Tandler asked, “How is it possible that there is not a single, politically moderate, female podcast interviewer other than Bari Weiss…? That's it? Just her? Literally, anybody can start a podcast today. No moderate women want to do it...? Why?”

Predictably, if you are a woman accustomed to answering the “Where are all the women??” question weekly, with “HERE! We are right here! Exhausted of being erased while everyone demands to know where we are,” many respondents were less-than-jovial in their responses.

TLDR: The “moderate” female podcasters are out here struggling to survive and break through an uninterested or censorial algorithm while the males producing similar content are getting rich. It’s frustrating to observe as it is, even moreso when people like Tandler wonder why none of us are trying.

Tandler doesn’t appear to be some out-of-touch rando, either. According to her her X bio, she is Chief Marketing Officer of a podcast app called Podcast AI, which apparently uses “the world's most advanced AI-powered tools” to help podcasters publish and promote their podcast, saving “over 80% of post-production time.” Wow! This sounds like something every female podcaster I know could use, considering most of us don’t have the funding to pay a team of people to produce, edit, and promote our podcast — meaning many of us (Me!) do it all ourselves.

The irony of Tandler’s question is that I think the reason she hasn’t heard of women like myself,

Meghan Daum

,

Bridget Phetasy

, and

Tara Henley

, for example, is that we are women. And despite our modern world, the boys club is still a real thing that also exists in the podcasting world. Men really do support, promote, and fund another another, helping to push each other up through the ranks, seemingly unaware of the women struggling to make it as well.

A key (but not the only) means to becoming a “prominent” podcaster is by either already being a prominent person, or by knowing prominent people, who have the means to fund you, so that you can produce better quality work and get others to do the things you either don’t have time to do or simply aren’t good at (understanding social media algorithms, producing good clips and thumbnails that get eyes and clicks, finding advertisers and companies to sponsor your podcast, ensuring you sound and look your best in audio and video, etc). You can certainly do well and become successful on your own, if you are consistent and dedicated enough to plug away for years, but eventually, if you want to move into the next realm, make real money, and produce something that looks very professional, you need big funding, and you are more likely get this by knowing the right people, shmoozing with those people, and having an entrepreneurial sense and drive.

Tandler offers this caveat herself, accidentally, adding that she wasn’t actually asking where all the women like me were, who were doing the thing she claimed didn’t exist, but that she actually meant “prominent” podcasters, who are “cracking 20k listens” per episode.

I have nothing personal against this person, who I have never heard of before (not prominent enough, I guess), but can’t help but wonder how you are literally in the business of helping support podcasters, but don’t understand that you need a significant platform, as well as a team of employees, and funding to pay those employees, to be able to produce a podcast that is famous enough for Michelle Tandler to have noticed.

This is not to discount skill and committment, of course. The reality is that a lot of now-well-known podcasters started off on their own, and just plugged away until they grew big enough to monetize. It’s very hard to build a following and audience — it takes both skill and consistency. In order to get good guests you need to be big already, and in order to get big, you need good guests. But you can do it, if you are good at what you do, work hard, and don’t give up.

This has literally been my experience, as someone who does indeed have a succesful podcast, which is to say, I manage to eek out a living and have a decent sized audience.

When I started podcasting, few others were. I was co-hosting and producing a feminist radio show out of my local co-op radio station in around 2009/10 when I began podcasting the shows. When I was ousted from the feminist collective running the show for (what else) trying to address the trans debate on air, via a series of interviews with “all sides” (we interviewed trans activists, trans academics, and radical feminists alike — the transcript of my interview with Lee Lakeman was republished at Feminist Current, though the rest of the interviews, sadly, have disappeared into the ether), I went out on my own, launching the Feminist Current podcast in 2012. I produced, hosted, edited, and promoted that show for over a decade, all by myself. When I started it, it was the only feminist podcast advocating for women’s sex-based rights and offering pushback against gender identity ideology. I interviewed hundreds of women over the years (and some men), building up a decent listener base and audience. I never monetized the podcast, but just relied on monthly donors who supported my work.

By 2020, I began to want to branch out. Doing a “feminist” podcast no longer felt right to me, having lost interest in attaching myself to political or ideological labels, and I wanted to address topics and talk to people outside the limiting sphere of feminism and women’s rights. I launched The Same Drugs in March 2020, just as the whole Covid shebang was launched upon us, and was gifted with the ability to figure out what the hell was actually going on, in large part through skeptical guests like Toby Young and Peter Hitchens. I was lucky to already have an established audience, but at the same time, starting anew (and without Twitter, which had been my primary social media platform before I was “permanently” banned in 2018, for the crime of saying “Men aren’t women, tho”) was a risk.

There is a lot of truth to the “anyone can start a podcast” refrain, but there is an enormous difference between starting a podcast and maintaining a podcast, every week, gaining an audience, and being able to afford to continue doing the substantial work one must put into producing the podcast. You can’t really do it for free in the long term unless you already have money and time. Ideally, you are business-minded and, once the podcast has become relatively successful (i.e. has a decent number of listeners), you can monetize. I am not, alas, business-minded, and frankly have enjoyed and feel proud of the fact both my podcasts grew organically, only supported and funded by listeners who generously pay for a monthly subscription or donation. I like not feeling beholden to advertisers, funders, a boss, some company, or the Russians. Indeed, this is what has allowed me to be so heretical (and so me) in my work.

At the same time, because I have failed to adopt an entrepreneurial spirit, I have also failed to earn the kind of money so many of the podcast bros have managed to aquire. I didn’t become a writer, journalist, and podcaster because I wanted to run a business — I did it so that I could cover issues and ideas others were not, so I could learn, help connect others with new ideas and thinkers, and hopefully effect change. Without the platforms I created and ran on my own, there would have literally been nowhere for me to speak against gender identity ideology, for example, having been blacklisted by Canadian media and censored online. Independent media is one of the only tools we have for truly heterodox thought and speech. Again, a real gift, but not one that’s easy to navigate in a world run by algorithms run by corporations and governments who treat silencing dissent as their full time job.

The question of "Where are all the female podcasters" is frustrating for a variety of reasons, though there is some truth behind the question…

There really aren’t many women who do what I do. Most female podcasters seem more drawn towards sex-, relationship-, and gossip-style podcasts, or go the health and wellness route. Very few women are interviewing the kinds of people I am, week after week. What I am doing really is more of a “male” model, if you look at those producing something similar to I — interviews about political, heterodox ideas and issues (though of course I cover other things as well — friendship, health, addiction, relationships, etc.) While there are a few women doing something similar, there are far, far more men doing it.

I suppose this should offer me a niche, which I suppose there might be a way of monetizing, but god help me if I know how to do that or have the time to figure it out.

While my first reaction to Tandler’s question was to wonder why so many people are incapable of hearing women when they speak, thinking perhaps there is a lack of interest in female podcast hosts versus male ones, but I think my podcast is evidence that this is not true. I enjoy a literal 50/50 split between male and female listeners, and have no trouble booking quality, well-known guests of both sexes.

On some level, I think there is truth to the fact many men prefer to listen to male voices than female ones, whether that be because of literal tone of voice, or perhaps trust in a man who approaches conversations assuming he is an expert deserving of a platform, which relays a kind of confidence appreciated by other men. But on another, we can see the success that women like Bari Weiss and Megyn Kelly have had (not without a fight, of course), and I can see my own experience, which has been one of being equally supported by men and women alike.

My problem might be a “woman” one in a way — I am overly attached to authenticity and have an aversion to schmoozing or doing anything that feels contrived and fake; I have no idea how to run a profitable business and no real desire to take time away from my actual work to learn; and I don’t like asking for money or selling myself — all things which don’t lend oneself to getting rich, and all things men seem more apt at. I didn’t opt to move to Austin with the rest of the crowd, but instead checked out to a happy, simple, peaceful life in Mexico, so am left out of (and often forgotten) as part of the heterodox/media circles.

All this is to say that while indeed there is a maddening sexism behind the “Where are all the women” question (if only you’d been listening, you’d know?), I have made my choices on account of my values and the life I desire to live. I could have made different ones, and felt like I was selling out or been unhappy (but leveled up financially), but didn’t want to, and frankly don’t think I’m even capable of that. The entire reason The Same Drugs exists and that I exist as I do is because I’ve refused to play the game. And that refusal of course comes with pitfalls (as well as blessings).

Perhaps my meandering attempt at figuring all this out here can constitute a pitch, in and of itself: if you appreciate my voice, work, values, and podcast, please consider becoming a paid subscriber here on Substack, or — even less effort — go on over to Spotify and click the follow button on The Same Drugs podcast. Actually, doing both would be the best! These are the small things that make a huge difference to me, and my ability to continue doing this work, as a woman, existing in a world that apparently doesn’t want to see or hear me.

Thank you all for being here either way! I really do feel so blessed to have the life I do, and to have a platform to speak my mind, share ideas, learn from those I respect so much, and to create something I enjoy and feel proud of. To do this for a living, no matter how meagre, is a dream, and I wouldn’t give it up for anything.

Thank you for being here with me.