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“The removal of the locking briefcase from civil society was a feminist conspiracy,” right-wing grifter Jacob Wohl declares

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By David Futrelle

Right-wing grifter Jacob Wohl may not be big on honesty, or integrity, or “not breaking the law,” but he apparently feels very strongly about privacy — at least his own, and that of men cheating on their partners and/or going to hockey games.

In a recent Instagram post, Wohl offered a strangely impassioned defense of the locking briefcase, declaring that its current unfashionableness is the result of a dastardly feminist plot against, I guess, men who want to keep their affairs hidden from their wives or girlfriends.

jacobawohl
I use a locking briefcase. Whenever I walk through an airport or an office building with it, people stop and compliment it. They say “Wow! you never see those anymore” — The removal of the locking briefcase from civil society was a feminist conspiracy. Back in old days, if a man had an extra cell phone, it would go in the briefcase when he got home. Love note from his secretary? Locking briefcase. Hockey tickets along the ice for him and his friends? Locking briefcase. Thanks to the feminists, men are now expected to carry around a soft, suede bag (preferably in a feminine color). It’s time for men to take their privacy back. Get a locking briefcase today! P.S. NEW BLOG POST (link in bio)

Wohl, who used to portray himself as a finance whiz, is currently facing felony charges in California for alleged “unlawful sale of securities,” so it’s not hard to see why he might want to keep a whole lot of things about his life secret.

H/T — @AsherLangton, who reposted Wohl’s little manifesto on Twitter

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Rhuu - apparently an illiterati
Rhuu - apparently an illiterati
5 years ago

I was thinking about how briefcases aren’t really a thing anymore the other day, and I concluded it was for the same reason I haaaate clutches. I like having both hands free.

Backpacks 4 life.

Also, did we have cellphones (extras of them?) and locking briefcases at the same time???

Cat Mara
Cat Mara
5 years ago

Apparently, this gobshite has never heard of dual-SIM phones…

kupo
kupo
5 years ago

I, too, remember back in the 1950s when locking briefcases were all the rage and we would put our extra cell phones in them.

Moggie
Moggie
5 years ago

I used to have a rather nice Samsonite briefcase, until one day feminists held me down and replaced it with a pink handbag. It’s not even a real Givenchy, just a knock-off!

numerobis
numerobis
5 years ago

I take it you need a locking briefcase to hike the Appalachian Trail?

Robert Haynie
Robert Haynie
5 years ago

Okay. Something kinda seemed off about this. So, I decided to hit up Amazon (Because they sell everything but souls, and some have concerns about that) and checked on briefcases.

With almost nary an exception, true briefcases (The things with shoulder straps are more properly called messenger bags) all had one thing in common.

They had locks. Most had two. Some had three. They ranged from simple keys to multiple digit combination to one I honestly couldn’t identify. So, for that matter, did a fair number of the above mentioned messenger bags, and those that didn’t could easily be locked by buying a goddam lock and putting it on the bag.

Mr. Wohl, I have to wonder where you live and work where they have vanished, because they’re certainly still here.

Moggie
Moggie
5 years ago

You know where his locking briefcase gets the most compliments? Hipster coffee shops.

Egret
Egret
5 years ago

I have an old-timey Samsonite suitcase with locks that I lug along hwen I travel; my hands are locked in a claw position and beet red by the time I get through security. I like the “aesthetic” but it is a miserable experience.

mothkiller
mothkiller
5 years ago

Papers giving evidence of your fraudulent actions? Locking briefcase.

My question is, how did this feminist conspiracy even accomplish this? It has to be by convincing people to switch right? You can still buy a locking briefcase. So the task of subtly changing the purchasing behavior of millions of Americans is really hard. I imagine the leaders of this conspiracy would be courted by the heads of marketing companies pulling off this feat would be like their holy grail.

Not Edward
Not Edward
5 years ago

I suspect no-one uses briefcases any more because no-one uses paper files any more. Hasn’t he heard of laptops?

Naglfar
Naglfar
5 years ago

I prefer messenger/duffel bags on my shoulder. Keeps my hands free and IMO is more stylish than a backpack or briefcase.
I own a locking briefcase that I bought at a rummage sale a while ago, but never use it because it’s too big and unwieldy (about the size of a large suitcase but without wheels, just a handle). I also have a locking guitar case that looks rather like an elongated briefcase, but much bigger to hold an electric guitar. Mysteriously, these were not confiscated by the feminist conspiracy.
I’ll keep an eye out for the briefcase confiscation squads, though. Hopefully they won’t take the guitar case and force me to use a soft case. /s

I would guess the reason briefcases fell out of fashion has more to do with the fact that people carry less to work now that a lot is digital, and that it’s uncomfortable to carry them with one hand. I’m not much for them, but if Mr. Wohl wants to use a briefcase, he can knock himself out. Hopefully it contains evidence which can be used to convict him and send him to prison, where he can instead go to the hipster prison dining hall.
The only person I’ve known to carry a briefcase in the last few years was a teacher I had in high school, who circa 2012 still carried a steel locking briefcase.

@Rhuu

Also, did we have cellphones (extras of them?) and locking briefcases at the same time???

Maybe he’s talking about this:comment image
If you have one of those, you will likely need a bag or briefcase of some sort to carry it in, as it probably won’t fit in your pocket.
The other thing to note is that Jacob Wohl is 21. Cell phones have been around his whole life, so he probably doesn’t remember a time without them.

@Not Edward

Hasn’t he heard of laptops?

You’d think he’d have seen some in the hipster coffee shops he frequents.

Aleks
Aleks
5 years ago

Yes, women did away with locking briefcases. Which is why every high-ranking British politician gets a locking despatch box with government papers, including the Queen. A woman. Dear God, how can that be? Women killed locking work cases for everyone everywhere, especially teh menz, yet women politicians get them. How is this possible??

If you need to lock your work up so that your spouse can’t see it, either you have a super high security clearance and better not drag sensitive documents home, or you’re a sketchy asshole and your spouse knows it. Possibly a criminal. Just like Wohl, here.

Moggie
Moggie
5 years ago

OT, but this is too good not to post: I (21M) laughed at my girlfriend’s (21F) use of Microsoft Powerpoint during sex. How do I rekindle our relationship?

I really shouldn’t kink-shame, but I can’t tolerate Powerpoint use.

Naglfar
Naglfar
5 years ago

@Moggie
PowerPoint fetish? That’s a new one. I know about Wikipedia use during sex, though:
comment image

Yutolia the Laissez-Fairy Pronoun Boner
Yutolia the Laissez-Fairy Pronoun Boner
5 years ago

Whenever I have locking things, I happily lock them just because I can… then I promptly lose the keys.

Moggie
Moggie
5 years ago

@Yutolia, briefcase locks are rarely any good. I’ve picked a couple, and my lockpicking skills suck.

Do lawyers still use briefcases? Lil Jacob’s father is a lawyer, and he’s desperate to be a grown-up like daddy.

Naglfar
Naglfar
5 years ago

@Moggie
Don’t know about most lawyers, but I just texted a friend who is a lawyer to ask if she uses a briefcase. She does not.

But she does have 2 cellphones, so one wonders where she puts her other phone.

Moggie
Moggie
5 years ago

@Naglfar, she probably has an associate carry all her stuff.

weirwoodtreehugger: chief manatee

Love notes from your secretary? Somehow I don’t think he’s going to have to worry about that.

You know what else you don’t see much of anymore? Locking diaries. Did the feminist conspiracy destroy those too? Even though they were marketed at girls?

Alan Robertshaw
Alan Robertshaw
5 years ago

@ moggie

Do lawyers still use briefcases?

There’s a rather weird convention that barristers don’t use briefcases. Which is especially ironic bearing in mind the derivation of the name.

Some people do of course; but technically we’re supposed to use these things.

https://www.stanley-ley.co.uk/acatalog/barrister-bag.html

The tradition is that the bags are supposed to be a gift from a more senior barrister.

I’ve always just used an assortment of rucksacks though.

Talonknife
Talonknife
5 years ago

I tend to assume any locking briefcase I see is full of stacks of hundred dollar bills that somehow fill up the volume of the briefcase perfectly.

Full Metal Ox
Full Metal Ox
5 years ago

@weirwoodtreehugger: chief manatee:

You know what else you don’t see much of anymore? Locking diaries. Did the feminist conspiracy destroy those too? Even though they were marketed at girls?

Mind if I use that as a springboard to launch a grumble (admittedly culturally dated) about the arbitrary gendering of things you wouldn’t think would need to be?

Some years ago, a young man of my acquaintance requested a diary for his eighth birthday; what I found in the way of cover patterns were flowers, kittens, cosmetic and women’s fashion items, female-targeted licensed characters, and pastel color schemes out the wazoo. (Note that if he were himself okay with such motifs, I wouldn’t have hesitated to get him some.) It took me a mile-and-a-half walk and no fewer than eight stores to find something that wasn’t stereotypically “girly”, settling for an anchor upon a ground of blue-and-white stripes.

Way to encourage boys to Use Their Words.

Lainy
Lainy
5 years ago

Briefcases use to have locks on them?

Naglfar
Naglfar
5 years ago

@Full Metal Ox

Way to encourage boys to Use Their Words.

It’s also hard for people who are gender nonconforming or who are of a certain gender but not interested in those things. My younger sister always found it annoying when she was younger that everything she was given (diaries, toys, books, etc) had sparkles and princesses when she was instead into sports and yaks.

@Lainy
Yes, and a lot still do. I somewhat doubt the quality of the locks, but they are there.

Specialffrog
Specialffrog
5 years ago

@Moggie: you could argue that a PowerPoint fetish is a form of masochism.

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