Last week I did it again. Some bloke on the timeline had posted a thread about how women in media need to “stop being so emotional” if they want to be taken seriously. Classic. I quoted the whole thing, tore it apart line by line, called it the usual tired patriarchal deflection, then finished with “anyway love you really babes, go touch some grass.” He replied within four minutes. First message was all caps rage. Second one, after I’d already moved on to making tea, was “wait are you actually being nice or is this some new feminist tactic.” I sent back a voice note laughing so hard I nearly dropped the mug. That’s the bit they never clock. The outrage is real. The friendliness is also real. They just can’t hold both in their heads at the same time.
It started young. Basildon council estate, late nineties, early two thousands. You learned fast that being soft got you walked over and being a complete cow got you isolated. So you developed this middle gear. You could tell your mate her new boyfriend was a wrong’un without making her cry in the playground. You could tell the lads on the corner to piss off while still sharing your chips. My mum did it every Sunday. She’d have a go at my dad for leaving his socks on the floor, call him a lazy so-and-so, then five minutes later she’d be asking if he wanted extra gravy. No one thought it was mixed signals. It was just how we spoke. Direct, a bit sweary, but never actually cruel for the sake of it. When I moved to Hackney the same mouth got me labelled “aggressive” by people who’d never set foot east of Stratford. Funny how that works.
Journalism made it worse and better at the same time. You spend your days reading the worst of humanity. Another MP caught with his trousers down. Another celebrity saying something thick about trans kids. Another think-piece arguing that poor people should just budget better. The rage sits in your chest like a second heartbeat. Some days I wake up already furious and I haven’t even checked my phone. Then I open the laptop and the first email is from a source who’s been through hell and still found time to send a voice note calling me “hun” and asking how my mum’s roast was. That contrast is the job. You can’t do this work if you go fully numb. You also can’t do it if you stay at a constant eleven. So you learn to drop the temperature without dropping the point.
I remember one afternoon in the Coven group chat. Twelve of us, all lefty journos and activists, dropping leaks and gossip and the occasional unhinged rant. Someone posted a screenshot of a well-known columnist who’d written that working-class women “perform victimhood for clicks.” I typed the reply before I’d even finished reading. Called it classist garbage, listed three examples from the last month, then added “but also she’s clearly having a week so maybe we give her a minute, poor cow.” Half the chat sent crying-laughing emojis. The other half sent the “this is why we love you” stickers. That’s the rhythm. You don’t have to choose. You can hold the line and still leave the door open.
Online it’s even sharper. A tweet can travel further than your actual voice ever will. I’ve had threads hit a hundred thousand likes before breakfast and the quote tweets split clean down the middle. One camp calling me a hero. The other camp calling me a bully who hides behind “babes.” Both camps miss the point. I’m not performing niceness to soften the blow. The niceness is just how my brain is wired. I grew up in a place where you could slag someone off and still borrow a fiver off them the next day. That doesn’t disappear because I now write for outlets that think “problematic” is a complete sentence.
There was a night last winter I nearly lost it. I’d been live-tweeting a protest, freezing my arse off in Hackney, blue nails going purple, vape cloud mixing with the breath of two hundred other people shouting the same slogans. Some bloke in a North Face jacket started filming me and yelling that feminists were the real problem. I turned the camera on him, told him his entire worldview was built on not having to think too hard, then asked if he wanted a sip of my flat white because he looked peaky. He actually took the cup. Stood there sipping oat milk while I finished the sentence about systemic this and internalised that. Later he slid into my DMs to say he’d never been called out and offered a hot drink in the same minute. That’s the bit that stays with me. Not the argument. The fact that the friendliness landed harder than the fury.
People assume the two things cancel each other out. They don’t. The outrage keeps me honest. If I stopped getting angry I’d stop noticing the patterns. The friendliness keeps me human. If I dropped that I’d just become another shouting head on the internet and there are already too many of those. My therapist tried to unpack it once. She asked if I was using the “babes” as a defence mechanism so no one could accuse me of being too harsh. I told her no. I use it because that’s how I talk to people I actually like. Even the ones I’m currently dismantling. She wrote something down and changed the subject. Fair enough.
Family still don’t get it either. Last time I went home for roast my cousin asked why I couldn’t just be nice all the time like I used to be. I said I am nice. I just refuse to pretend everything’s fine when it isn’t. She rolled her eyes and passed the potatoes. My mum, though, she clocked it immediately. “That’s your nan all over,” she said. “Could tell you your jumper was ugly and still knit you another one the next week.” Exactly. The bloodline is strong.
Some days the mix feels like a superpower. You can walk into a room, clock the dynamic in thirty seconds, and still leave everyone feeling like you were on their side even while you were telling them they were wrong. Other days it just feels knackering. You spend so much energy translating yourself for people who only want one version. The furious version or the friendly version. They rarely want both. I used to try and pick a lane. Didn’t last. The second I softened the call-outs I felt like I was lying. The second I dropped the “hun” I felt like I was performing someone else’s anger. So I stopped choosing.
There’s a particular look people get when it happens in person. The slight freeze, the half-smile that doesn’t know if it’s allowed. I saw it last month at a panel. I’d just finished explaining why a certain editor’s framing of a story was quietly racist, then I turned to the woman next to me and asked if she wanted the last biscuit because she looked like she needed the sugar. The room did that little collective inhale. Afterwards three different people came up to say they couldn’t tell if I was being sarcastic. I wasn’t. I never am about the biscuit. Or the point.
I think about it most on the train back from London. Feet up on the opposite seat, wrappers everywhere, brain still buzzing from whatever I’ve just written. Some kid across the aisle will be watching a video with the sound off and I’ll catch myself muttering at the screen like the person in it can hear me. Then I’ll notice the kid smiling and I’ll smile back and suddenly the whole carriage feels less hostile. That’s the job in miniature. Stay angry enough to see what’s broken. Stay friendly enough that people don’t shut the door before you’ve finished the sentence.
I don’t have a neat conclusion. I still wake up most mornings already halfway to furious about something I haven’t even read yet. I still sign off half my messages with “babes” even when the message itself is a demolition job. The two things live in the same mouth and I’m done pretending that’s a contradiction. It’s just how I was built. Council-estate girl who made it to Hackney and never bothered to sand the edges off. You can take the outrage. You can take the friendliness. Most people only want one. I’m not splitting myself in half to make it easier for them.
So if you ever see me call your take bare problematic and then immediately ask how your mum’s doing, don’t overthink it. Both parts are true. That’s the whole trick. Stay mad. Stay kind. Keep the door open even while you’re kicking it. And if that confuses you, well. Welcome to the club, hun.