Methods for a Lazy Revolution

Changing the game in independent media.

Oct 22, 2023

As regular readers may know, or as you might have picked up from the about section or intro post, I am a contributing member of

Lazy Women

, and have been for around three years. I first responded to a content call via Twitter (back in the day), thinking they’d never reply, but I was pleasantly surprised when I, and my written words, were welcomed into the community and onto the platform with open arms.

I gradually became more involved with other members, have been encouraged to write more for the website, and now also support the community more widely including through podcast promotion (and actually recorded an episode of my own!) as well as partnership coordination. Every member of Lazy Women brings an interesting back story, a plethora of skills and ideas, and the range of languages spoken and experiences lived across the community is nothing short of mind-blowingly impressive. It’s a circle I’m grateful to be a part of, and one that I want to not only survive, but to flourish.

Which is why today’s post will take a slightly different format as I share with you a brief interview with the core Lazy Women team, as they are in the midst of a hectic, at times stressful, but highly exciting crowdfunding campaign to generate a more sustainable model for the platform and all it entails. Wanting to practise what they preach, and revolutionise the approach to online content creation, feminist movements, and the general notion that important work all too often must be done for free, Lazy Women are working hard to raise funds to pay contributors for their time and skills, and create a real equitable workplace for something that started as a “hobby blog” but has become so so much more.

As a contributor myself, of course I have a vested interest in the campaign, and it’s results, but this goes far beyond whether or not I receive payment for a future post I may write for Lazy Women. This is about supporting ambition, preventing burnout, and being in awe at the commitment of a risky venture.

So, without further ado…

Hi team! Could you introduce yourselves for readers?

Lucie Hunter: Hi everyone, and thanks a lot for inviting us, Lauren! I’m Lucie, originally from the Czech Republic but now permanently stationed down south in Italy (I blame the food and wine). I’m currently finishing my PhD in Political Sociology, exploring art movements and their role in repressive societies. Aside from uni, I’m mostly involved in Lazy Women where I coordinate our podcast and help co-run the entire project. If I have any time left, I focus on freelance (documentary) filmmaking, writing, and sound editing. On the weekend, you can usually find me roaming through Florentine galleries, passionately/obsessively advocating for the societal role of art, or sipping (red) wine while reading a book in a local enoteca or cafe, a.k.a. my happy place.

Dorina Nagy: Hello there! My name is Dorina and I was born and raised in the Hungarian countryside but am currently living in Vienna, Austria in the hope for a more secure future. I have just started a Master’s degree program in Gender Studies and am working as a social worker in a counselling centre for sex workers while juggling my activist life, part of which is my contribution to Lazy Women’s activities and being part of the community. In my free time I like going to raves and festivals but I equally appreciate cosy weekends reading, watching films or discussing philosophical questions with my partner.

Zsofi Borsi: Hi hi! My name is Zsofi, originally from Budapest but living in Paris. I founded Lazy Women back in 2020 during lockdown, while doing a masters at the Central European University in Vienna. I was fed up with the content on mainstream media at the time about how we should “use” our time in the pandemic to re-emerge thinner, prettier or more productive and wanted to create a fun, creative and daring online space that isn’t afraid to challenge norms around feminism and productivity. Today I am editor-in-chief of the platform, managing our written content. Besides this, I also juggle a part-time job at a tech start-up where I am also editor of another magazine.

Wow - busy times for all!

And so, could you tell us more about what the Lazy Revolution is?

Lucie: On the one hand, the Lazy Revolution is a crowdfunding campaign that we launched at the end of September in order to secure our financial stability for the upcoming year and to help us turn into a real independent feminist media platform. For more than three years now, we have been sustained entirely through volunteer work. However, as the project grew, more members joined in, and we started publishing even more content (including our very own podcast and newsletter!), such a large amount of work quickly became too much to handle solely during our spare time, as all of us juggle full time jobs and study responsibilities aside from Lazy Women. This campaign is the first major step towards this transformation.
Dorina: On the other hand, the Lazy Revolution is so much more than just a crowdfunding campaign. It stems from the core values of our project and community and is deeply rooted in our overall mission: to make women’s work visible and fairly remunerated, to uplift voices normally under-represented in the mainstream, to create a safe online space and community where no topics are taboo and where women empower and inspire each other rather than compete, and where creativity and values are put at the forefront of our work ethics instead of being just an afterthought.
Zsofi: We dream of bringing in a true revolution of the workspace, turning it into a flexible and caring community, while still delivering meaningful and top-quality content, accompanied by professional artwork, specialised events, and public workshops. We dream of not being just a media platform, but also a true community, with supporting local hubs and regular meetups in major cities in Europe and beyond. We dream of helping even more women to find their creative voice and confidence and to pursue jobs that actually feel meaningful to them, while empowering them to strive for a tangible societal change. And last but not least, we dream of having a real influence on the discussion of gender equality and hustle culture, bringing our voices up towards the policy level.

Lazy Women was started during the pandemic – arguably quite revolutionary in itself! But why does now feel like the right time for the campaign?

Zsofi: That’s a really good question and perhaps one we should be addressing more often. A lot has changed during the past year, to be honest…
Lucie: Last autumn, Lazy Women was registered as an association in France, strengthening our commitment to promoting gender equality and diversity of voices in the public sphere. Right after that, we were selected as one of 15 European media outlets for a prestigious six-month long Transition Accelerator Programme organised by the International Press Institute. This presented a real shift in our thinking - we realised that Lazy Women fills a really big gap in the media sphere - a bold, women-run outlet with a diverse range of voices and lived experiences, bringing in a completely new point of view, which resonates especially with younger readers suspicious of traditional media outlets.
Dorina: Seeing the potential in transforming our platform into a professional media outlet, we decided to take the risk and go all in - because if not now, then when, really. We believe in what we do, we have an amazing and supportive community, and it just feels like the right time to take Lazy Women to the next level :)

It really has been a big year for Lazy Women, and this seems like a great next step to further professionalise all that you (we!) have been doing.

So, as you might know,
The Navigation
focuses on musings, meanderings and methods, as well as a “Cultural Compass” round-up of recommendations. Thinking about these in turn, and the ethos of Lazy Women, I wonder if you could perhaps share ….

Musings on laziness?

Lucie: My journey towards laziness has been fairly rocky - I grew up seeing women in my family constantly jumping around the house or looking after kids despite having full time jobs and other responsibilities on top of it. Sitting down to just read and relax was always considered inappropriate and “unproductive.” Driving myself to become a workaholic and stopping just before a severe burnout, I realised that rest was a much more revolutionary concept than productivity. And much more caring as well. That’s what laziness is for me now - self-love and a tool of everyday rebellion :)

Dorina: Although I have the same experiences of seeing my female relatives “keeping busy” since I was a kid, I always preferred laziness, finding the easiest, least exhausting way of doing things, like rejecting doing something which didn’t bring any results for me, merely for appearance's sake (like keeping an immaculate house)... But that doesn't mean I wasn't criticised for my laziness, both on the outside and on the inside. Why can’t I be as perfect as everybody else? I asked myself often. Now knowing that many struggle with the same issues, thanks to Lazy Women, I am finding peace with my so-called shortcomings of trying to be flawless at all times.

Zsofi: As for everyone, my relationship to laziness is complicated and filled with contradictions. On the one hand, I’ve always been extremely hard-working when it comes to my studies or professional achievements. On the other hand, I have never been someone to accept rules or constraints that don’t make sense and I don’t do well with these kinds of inflexible arrangements, such as working in an office 9-5, or doing something I consider deeply meaningless and unnecessary. In these situations, when I refuse to “comply”, sometimes it does create the impression that I am in fact lazy, but I am actually proud of this trait as it has only led me closer to finding what I’m actually interested in or motivated by, so I’m trying to embrace it.

Meanderings through establishing an international community of women?

Lucie: The most significant part, or even prerequisite for this journey for me personally was becoming an immigrant - and meeting women from all around the world. I didn't really discover feminism until I left my home country. I’ve never really felt deep kinship and a sense of belonging with women outside of my family until I was “adopted” by my international community. And despite having moved several times, these deep connections stemming out of a shared lived experience continue unscathed.

Zsofi: For me, it’s also about empathy. Being able to put yourself in the shoes of other women’s life stories, experiences, and challenges - the personal context they are writing or contributing from. Starting an international community of women has shown me how much we share despite local contexts or differences, and allowed me to become a more flexible and caring movement leader.

Methods for starting a Lazy Revolution?

Lucie: Be honest to yourself. What is it that you truly value in life? Are you getting enough of it? Are you left with enough time to pursue it, develop it, cherish it? And if not, what is preventing you from doing so? Many of us have unmovable obligations - having to make our ends meet, taking care of children or the elderly, a mortgage - but more often than not, we tend to pigeonhole ourselves in situations that do not actually leave us satisfied but we are already too tired, apathetic and habituated to it all that we do not even realise it. For me, the first revolutionary step is to slow down, take stock, and truly notice ourselves - is this where I actually want to be? And if not, what is the first step towards changing it?

Zsofi: Make space for others, and don’t be afraid of starting something without having everything figured out. You shouldn’t wait for that ‘big moment’ when everything will make sense because it will never come. Dare to start it without knowing where it will lead you.

Three key “Cultural Compass” Lazy Women pieces of content - written, video, or audio - you’d like to share with readers?

Lucie: From our recent releases, it would definitely be Zsofi’s and Una’s podcast episode on the quarter-life crisis. Standing at a crossroad now, I’ve been thinking a lot about it recently. All the expectations and responsibilities falling on our shoulders and the heavy and often paralysing mixture of guilt, impostor syndrome, and unmet needs or ambitions, while we try to distinguish what it is that we actually want for ourselves from what we think others might be expecting of us.

Dorina: I keep coming back to Izzi’s piece on gendered time. Actually, I extended that perspective in my head to neurodivergent time, classist time etc. How we are expected to evolve and do things in a time frame which has never suited us. And with what we are spending that time. Whose expectations are we filling there? And how little attention we give to really questioning things. Sometimes I fall into an existential crisis thinking about the time we spend on Earth and what we are doing here at all. Sorry for getting kind of philosophical here haha.

We love philosophical thinking!

Zsofi: In terms of video work, I would definitely suggest watching our crowdfunding video. I think it shows best how our platform fits into the wider context of democratic backsliding, with independent and progressive media and cultural associations sustaining constant attacks. In an environment like this, it is more important than ever to build open spaces, even if only digital ones, that are not afraid to open taboo topics, speak out against injustices, and provide a sense of belonging to those who might feel confused or isolated. We also hint at our future plans and include a few testimonies from our contributors (including Lauren!), in case you want to hear some concrete examples.