I was horrified by the conversation about the force-feeding in Mauritania. It was a story that has stayed with me for the past week. I finally have come to realize what was so unnerving about it — yes, of course, the report itself is heartbreaking, but what was worse was the flippant way in which the interviewer, Marco Werman, introduced the topic. “…and that’s because the men in Mauritania like their women on the extra-large side…” as if it were a joke, or a sensational fetish. It is sensational, and it is, in a way, a fetish. But more than these, it’s an extreme expression of misogyny. Whether you’re Chinese and bind the feet of your women, or you’re Mauritanian, and make them gain a hundred pounds, you are exercising your domination of women, making them less than human, arranging it so they’ll have no way of contesting your power. I would have appreciated if Mr. Werman would have called a spade a spade.