This episode of The Dig is brought to you by our listeners who support us at patreon.com

and by Verso Books, which has loads of great left-wing titles, perfect for dig listeners like you. One that you might like is betraying Big Brother,

the Feminist Awakening in China by Leidah Hongfincher.

On the eve of International Women's Day in 2015, the Chinese government arrested five

feminist activists and jailed them for 37 days. The feminist five became a global cause celeb with Hillary Clinton speaking out on their behalf

and activists inundating social media

with hashtag free the five messages.

But the five are only symbols of a much larger feminist movement of

civil rights lawyers, labor activists, performance artists, and online warriors

prompting an unprecedented awakening

among China's educated urban women.

In betraying Big Brother, journalists and scholar Lehta Hongfincher

argues that the popular broad-based movement poses the greatest challenge to China's

authoritarian regime today.

Through interviews with the Feminist Five and other leading Chinese activists, Hong Fincher illuminates both the difficulties they face

and their joy of betraying Big Brother,

as one of the Feminist Five wrote of the defiance she felt during her detention.

Tracing the rise of a new feminist consciousness now finding expression through the Me Too movement,

and describing how the communist regime has suppressed the history of its own feminist struggles, betraying big... this the feminist awakening in China by Leda Hong Fincher out podcast from Jacobin magazine. My name is Daniel Denver and I'm broadcasting from Providence, Rhode Island.

The brutality of the Saudi royal family had been hiding in plain sight all along.

It was an open secret that was convenient to the political, media, and

business elites for whom the kingdom means big business and an invaluable geostrategic

...