Recommend me a book!

[RibenaBerry]

Right, reading these boards recently has given me a bit of a kick up the arse on my feminist principles. I've done a bit of 'light' reading in the area (think The Beauty Myth as a teenager) but think I need something a bit more serious without being so weighty I never pick it up. I'd rather have something published in, say, the last 15 years than any of the 'classics'.

Any ideas?

Because this is a thread about feminist books. You've read them, I've read them - it is a discussion.

Women can't fuck our way out of rape and a rape culture. - You'll laugh at yourself for saying this if you ever read the Yes Means Yes.

I'm not criticising you for having an opinion - It's wonderful to find people who are able to form opinions - just saying you don't get to decide if something 'isn't much use to women' just because you say so.

I know - it disn't pass me by.

You are right - I CANNOT pass by an uncritical view of Greer. She has done a lot of good, and it is a terrible shame that she now holds such bigoted views which are accepted uncritically because of the body of great work that she has done.

Thanks for the chat - shame that you see discussion as stupid but there you go

Why would I want to stop you talking dittany?

'Stamping in' - interesting. As I said personally, I find Eve Ensler's work empowering and her work in the Congo is inspirational. I am bemused as to how you can find City of Joy lightweight.

Thanks for your welcome. And your invitation to piss off to other parts of the site

dittany - can you tell me what you find 'lightweight' about City of Joy or the Panzi Hospital?

Your pronouncements about "you don't get to decide" just because I voiced an opinion. You were throwing your weight around.

You are misquoting me here.

I actually said:
just saying you don't get to decide if something 'isn't much use to women' just because you say so.

There is a difference made by partial quoting.

And I'm glad you did Prolesworth. Thanks

Fair dues dittany - I apologise for that
tweet, it was out of order.

I wasn't really 'baiting' as such, but I do find it unbelievable that you diss Ensler when she does such great work - especially within the DRC. And I wonder where you are coming from when being so dogmatic about theory.

For anybody that doesn't know about V Day's involvement in the DRC then please have a look at their site: drc.vday.org/

dittany -
Do you see it yet?
And you have the gall to call me passive-agressive!

I didn't say I don't like Greer - she has done some amazing work. But it's important to read her work critically as she is bigoted and is full of shit. For the most part she writes to provoke, but her position on trans women is indefensible and dangerous.

I'm glad you like the like the link to V Day Prolesworth - they are doing amazing work there. I'll go read your link now.

Returning to your posting of my tweets on here, which I apologise for, they obviously look different when taken out of context.

This tweet On a couple of the feminist threads. I'll try not to be abusive... was preceded by a tweet to me that explained that users are only banned for being abusive.

Explain how you can defend Greer when she writes shit like this?

Nowadays we are all likely to meet people who think they are women, have women?s names, and feminine clothes and lots of eyeshadow, who seem to us to be some kind of ghastly parody, though it isn?t polite to say so. We pretend that all the people passing for female really are. Other delusions may be challenged, but not a man?s delusion that he is female.

A blogger at The F-Word wrote this about the paragraph above:

How Greer can think that trans women living as men make the decision to transition to living as women based on a penchant for dresses and eye shadow when that transition will most probably involve putting oneself at further risk of harassment, discrimination, violence and even murder - due to both sexism and transphobia - is beyond me. She seems to think that because she?s Germaine Greer, it?s okay for her to call other people ?ghastly parodies? and refer to their lived experiences as ?delusions?. And quite apart from her cruelty and transphobia, to refer to trans women?s appearance as a ?parody? of womanhood is to accept that there is a ?true? female appearance, which undermines any argument that femininity is a social construct.
www.thefword.org.uk/blog/2009/08/greer_shows_her