SA: Another reason I believe The Toast is so popular is it’s doing something that hasn’t really been done before. Whereas the feminist blogs we’ve had — Jezebel, The Hairpin — occasionally are a bit chuckle-worthy, the things you publish are often belly laugh-worthy. I’m particularly in love with this approach because there’s this misconception that feminism and comedy are somehow at odds with one another — that the former is all about political correctness and the latter is the realm of men. Is that what you and Nicole were setting out to do, to wield comedy as a tool in the feminist fight? 

MO: I don’t know! To me they have never seemed mutually exclusive. For as long as I can remember I’ve loved making jokes, and for as long as I can remember I’ve been a feminist, so humor and feminism go hand in hand for me. I think of myself as a comedy writer first and foremost, so I think that’s sort of naturally been reflected on the site. There’s often a feminist sensibility that’s evident in my work, but just as often it has nothing to do with Big Feminist Issues. 

The goal, as always, has been to be so undeniably excellent that Christopher Hitchens drifts back up from the grave and admits that women are funny, and that I specifically am funnier than Kingsley Amis, and then he dissolves back into oblivion.

SA: This question is more about me than about you, but something I legitimately want to ask you: As managing editor of this magazine I do such tasks as run the Twitter handle and send press emails, which are usually a little sharp, occasionally a little lewd, in tone. (Which is the tone of the magazine.) The most recent email I sent had the subject line “Important Pumpkin Spice Latte Related Announcement” and then a first line that said “We thought that’d get your attention, you basic bitches.” (It was actually about our most recent contest winners.) We got called misogynists by a few folks on Twitter, got a little hate email, and some blog put up a post urging people to “boycott”