The Feminist Times To Close After Just 12 Months - Here's Why

Why The Feminist Times Is To Close After Just 12 Months

When radical feminist magazine Spare Rib relaunched as The Feminist Times last year, we were excited about the return of their iconic straight-talking, sexism-busting journalism.

But just 12 months after their re-naming ceremony, The Feminist Times have announced that this week will be their last.

In a saddening statement to readers, the publication say that they "simply cannot survive any longer".

Speaking to HuffPost UK Lifestyle, founder Charlotte Raven, editor Deborah Coughlin and deputy editor Sarah Graham explain why The Feminist Times is really shutting up shop.

Charlotte says she founded the magazine to bring "a radically alternative women's magazine focused on collaboration, honesty and pluralism, that would give a platform to marginalised women and issues" to the market.

"We wanted an alternative to women's magazines that would speak to normal women and compete with the mainstream, rather than just the theoretically informed, while also having a good sense of humour," she says.

The concept sounds fantastic, so why is the magazine closing after such a short period of time?

Sarah puts the magazine's closure down to "lack of sustainable funding."

"Two of our founding ethical principles were not exploiting writers (by paying everyone) and not taking advertising - two things that many others in the media do," she explains.

In order to keep afloat the publication tried crowd-funding and appealed for more paying members and donations, but sadly their business is no sustainable.

Although the magazine is coming to a close, in their statement to readers the editors say they are proud of their creation.

"We achieved what many others haven’t: we made a feminist online magazine that competed with the mainstream and we did it while keeping our principles intact," they write.

Charlotte says in the last year she has been most proud of: "Providing a platform for a pluralism of feminist voices, including those not heard elsewhere, doing so respectfully and exploring personal and political transformations small and large, as symbolised by our launch War on Spanx piece."

It seems a crying shame that a dedicated, moralistic and progressive magazine like The Feminist Times should be forced to close when other websites are cashing on content that is arguably anti-women.

When asked why she thinks this is happening, Sarah says: "It's easier to survive if you're horrible about people, and harder if you're not."

"It's also easier to survive if you've got loads of money behind you," Deborah adds.

So, what needs to change for a forward-thinking feminist publication like The Feminist Times to survive in the future?

Deborah believes that having some extra cash could have made all the difference.

"Money. It's the only thing that's been missing. It wasn't missing energy, it wasn't missing vision, it wasn't missing a gaping hole - it was very much filling a gap. But money. How to monetise something that's essentially anti-capitalist," she says.

Fans may be disappointed to hear that there are no immediate plans to re-model the magazine - Sarah and Deborah are both moving on to other projects.

There is a glimmer of hope though, as Charlotte is keeping the project on ice and meeting with people who get in touch with suggestions. She can be contacted on charlotte@feministtimes.com.

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