The boring and insidious world of women’s world

Osha Vance has a new podcast: Story time with the second lady. This is exactly what it sounds like. Each episode begins with a brief introduction, after which J.D. Vance’s wife reads a story to the children. The first three episodes were released on Monday, and none of them are longer than 11 minutes – children’s books are very short, after all.

It’s an unexpected move for Vance, who gave up her career as a high-profile lawyer to become second lady. But its pivot to podcasting isn’t entirely unprecedented. She’s simply the latest conservative wife to focus on content creation. It is a new front in the ongoing culture wars: instead of trying to reclaim supposedly liberal institutions, the right is hellbent on creating its own. If these institutions reinforce conservative gender norms, so much the better.

“I’ve always loved reading, from when I was a child until today,” Vance says in the opening episode, a reading of a Beatrix Potter book. “And now as a mother, spending stories with my children is the highlight of my day.” The story of Peter Rabbit. And lest anyone think that she will only read the classics in line with the right’s aversion to contemporary children’s literature, the second episode is a reading of… Cars – as in a book based on the Pixar film – featuring race car driver Danica Patrick, and the third is Playground lessons Read by author and Paralympian Brent Bobin.

This is quite anodyne, even healthy content, at least if you ignore the fact that the Trump administration Reduce grant funding for libraries. As Second Lady, Vance has championed literacy: Last year, she announced the Summer Reading Challenge for Kids. The challenge, Vance said, is to focus more deeply, be more present, and spend less time on devices. Her literary tastes deviate: she has read Hernán Díaz’s book Trust And Emily Wilson’s new translation of IliadThe latter has been much denigrated by conservatives. Story time with the second lady This appears to be the right’s response to Ms. Rachel, the popular children’s artist who, to the dismay of some conservatives, has spoken out about the ongoing war on Gaza and the Trump administration’s detention of migrant children.

Katie Miller, the wife of Trump adviser Stephen Miller, launched a podcast last year after leaving the Department of Government Efficiency, where she was a spokesperson. Erica Kirk took over her late husband’s media empire after his assassination. Unlike Kirk, both Miller and Vance create content that is ostensibly apolitical. Miller and Vance’s seemingly banal podcasts point to conservatives’ efforts to create a parallel media ecosystem, a project that signals their aspiration for the cultural relevance they feel the mainstream has deprived them of.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that some on the right want nothing more than to be loved. They are dissatisfied with authority; They want cultural cachet, and their politics of resentment are often born of an understanding that this desire will always remain elusive. Much of the MAGA movement is about the culture wars: it focuses on the wokeness of children’s cartoons, the liberal bent of Hollywood, and the perennial bogeyman of the drag queen story hour. It was Vans It is said that he is hurt Through the negative reaction to the film adaptation Hillbilly Elegy. The Vice President and the Second Lady are often harassed in public: it has happened She was booed at the recent Winter Olympics in Milan and Mocked the Kennedy Center. Reportedly, during Trump’s first term Avoid going out in public places Because of the number of times they have been harassed.

Unable to gain public support, these political wives have chosen to carve out spaces for themselves in conservative media. “There’s no place for conservative women to come together online,” Miller said when announcing her podcast in 2025. the New York Times He pointed out At the time, there was a thriving right-wing “feminist space” as embodied by magazines such as Evie and Governor And a range of podcasts including Brett Cooper ShowAlex Clark Culture PharmacyAnd Allie Beth Stuckey Related. But right-wing media relies on the illusion of rejection and violation — Miller needs to position herself as a conservative beacon in a sea of ​​liberal lifestyle content, because she has nothing else to set her apart from the crowd. Likewise, Vance’s podcast is the latest of many podcasts, some of which are overtly political.

The most interesting thing about Vance and Miller’s podcasts is that they’re not interesting at all. Rings Story time with the second lady Short: There’s a brief introduction, reading, and that’s it. Miller gives long interviews, but as Tess Owen writes… Listher podcast is “so boring.” Giving her access to some of the most powerful people in the country and the world — her former boss Elon Musk, FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and J.D. Vance himself — Miller asks tough questions like: Is a hot dog a sandwich? Its most significant cultural accomplishments are those few celebrities who have openly aligned themselves with the right: Dr. Oz; vaccine skeptic Jenny McCarthy; Fitness personality Jillian Michaels; Cheryl Hines, First Lady of MAHA; Mike Tyson; And Nicki Minaj, who recently threw a lot of MAGA fanfare. Miller’s latest guest is NBA player Tristan Thompson, who is perhaps most famous for cheating on Khloe Kardashian. (He is, for the record, good friends with Eric Trump and hates repeating clothes.)

For Vance and Miller, these podcasts also serve as a kind of rebranding. Miller has had political ambitions since graduating from college. She was involved in student government at the University of Florida, where she had her fair share of scandals. As assistant press secretary for the Department of Homeland Security during Trump’s first term, Miller was tasked with defending the administration’s family separation policy. She was so militant that her supervisor once sent her to the border in hopes of making her more sympathetic, which, as Miller later told journalist Jacob Soboroff, “didn’t work.” In the midst of this cruelty, she met Stephen Miller. The two patriots found love in a hopeless place. “Where does true love happen?” she said in a recent interview. “With regard to border security,” of course. Osha and J.D. Vance met at Yale Law School, where she was his “spiritual guide” through the rarefied world of university. Until her husband received the nomination for vice president, she worked at the prestigious firm of Munger, Tolles & Olson. Vance left this job to support her husband’s political goals and, apart from a few projects, remained largely out of the spotlight.

These are driven, high-achieving women who have recast themselves as domestics, even as they pursue careers (in Miller’s case) and projects (in Vance’s case) outside the home. This is the paradox of the influencer “The Merchant”: these are jobs and offers, a cunning disguise for professional ambition. It is also worth noting that Miller and Kirk sought fame and attention for most of their lives. As a teenager, Miller appeared on a reality show about her high school’s student newspaper. Kirk was a contestant on the reality show Summer house He founded a Christian clothing brand called Spiritual Gangster. By contrast, Vance is a reclusive figure, and her entry into podcasting is likely an attempt to fit into the more traditional role of second lady. Vance said she hopes to practice law again one day. For Miller, the podcast seems to be the pinnacle of her career. She spent all those years researching Homeland Security so she could one day interview Kardashian’s cheating ex.