Four Stars

I ended up following Laurie Penny (@pennyred) on Twitter at some point. She’s a UK-born-and-bred white journalist who writes about feminism, class, geek culture, and all that lies in between. She covered the Occupy movement, and many other uprisings stemming from young people recognizing that they are currently getting the shit end of the stick. If any of you are familiar with Anita Sarkeesian and Feminist Frequency, you might have come across the above video, as it was the second part of a conference talk in which Ms. Sarkeesian participated.

I enjoyed this book. I thought she shared interesting ideas in a way that I hadn’t been exposed to. This book is as far away from the Sheryl Sandburg-style b.s. lean in feminism as I think you can get if you are a white woman (which I think necessarily limits one’s ability to fully understand and discuss the intersection between gender and race that black women and other women of color experience). While nearly 250 pages long, the book only has five chapters, and I think that’s a good thing. It allows Ms. Penny to focus on creating mostly well-crafted and interesting essays on topics that, if you’ve read about, you’ve probably not read about in quite this way.

I enjoyed in particular her take in “Lost Boys,” which looks at the ways in which men are angry because they aren’t getting what they think has been promised them. She discusses the real ways that the patriarchy (oh, yeah, I said it) doesn’t just fuck over women, but it fucks over the majority of men as well. “People are realizing how they have been cheated of social, financial and personal power … but young men still learn that their identity and virility depends on being powerful. What I hear most from the men and boys who contact me is that they feel less powerful than they had hoped to be, and they don’t know who to blame.”

But lest you worry that this is a book about feminism that just focuses on men, the other chapters are full of somewhat new and definitely interesting ways of looking at gender and sexuality from the perspective of those who are freshly out of high school or college, or making their way into their late 20s. I just barely avoided joining the Millennial generation (I’m about a year too early, and thus a Gen X-er), but they have grown up in a world that is drastically different from the one I grew up in, and it shows in many ways, including how gender and class intersect.

She talks elegantly about rape culture, including sharing her own experience confronting her rapist years after the fact. She talks about the ways in which society puts the onus and blame on women to protect themselves, as opposed to on the men to, you know, not rape. And she rightfully points out that rape culture isn’t just about men raping women, but that it’s about the culture around how women are treated, from the work they might engage in (including sex work) to the clothes they wear to the choices they make around employment (if they even have choices).

I think this is a good book to add to the list of those who value feminism and who have some understanding of its background and history. It’s not as accessible a book to use to introduce a skeptic to feminism as, say, Full Frontal Feminism by Jessica Valenti, but not every book needs to – or should – be that.

Four Stars

After the shit show that was the (legislative side of the) election in the U.S. earlier this month, I needed to read a book that would both make me angry and inspire me. I hadn’t heard about this book before I saw it at our local bookstore, which surprises me, as I thought I was on all of the feminist killjoy mailing lists.

Pro is a well-researched, well-argued look at why abortion rights are so important. That “pro” stands for pro-choice, and it is explored from multiple directions and through different lenses. Ms. Pollitt’s main argument is that those who are “pro-life” aren’t actually pro-life, but more interested in policing the sexuality of women. This isn’t exactly ground-breaking; feminists have been saying this for years. But this book differs in that it lays out literally all of the arguments in favor of banning abortion (either at all stages of pregnancy, or at specific stages, or for different circumstances) and knocks each on down, showing the inconsistencies as well as the impacts these views have on very real women.

The book is over 200 pages long but it only has eight chapters, because each chapter is devoted to going really in-depth into an area of discussion. Early on she shares with us the data on U.S. views on abortion, and how they aren’t really that consistent with the actions U.S. voters support. She then explores the idea of “personhood,” and whether those who oppose abortion really do view the blastocyst, embryo, or first trimester fetus as a person with the same rights as the pregnant person (ultimately arguing that they don’t, because of the other actions they take). This is followed by an exploration of whether women are actually people, some myths about abortion, and then the concept that it isn’t so much abortion, but what abortion represents (woman’s increased control of her life) that pro-life people oppose. Finally, she ends with a look at why compromise isn’t actually an option, followed by what it would mean to truly support women as mothers.

The only problem I have with this book is one that I have with any book that talks about reproductive rights, and it is the complete lack of recognition of the trans issues involved. Yes, it is usually women who are the target of laws restricting abortion, but trans men can also get pregnant, and are victimized by these laws as well, and there’s just no mention of that.

The author claims the target audience of the book is people who aren’t really sure where they stand on the issue, and I agree that these folks might find this book interesting. I think it’s also great for those of us who are very clear on where we stand but could use a little additional education.

Five Stars* (see update below)

There’s an awesome podcast out there called Citizen Radio, and it is amazing. The hosts are a comic and journalist, respectively, who record at their home and talk about news that either doesn’t get covered or that gets covered in ridiculous ways. There is a ton of swearing, a lot of joking, some bizarre recurring characters (“Republican Baby,” for example), and a crap ton of actual, honest, news. Citizen Radio is independent media that seeks the truth without being worried about what sponsors are going to think. It’s funding wholly by members like me, but is available to everyone for free.

What does that have to do with this book? Well, this book is written by the hosts of Citizen Radio. It’s a progressive look at the ways in which the news fails: fails to tell us the truth, fails to cover the stories that matter, and fails to do what journalism should do. It’s an easy read (as in, it’s written conversationally; the topics themselves are not in any way light), and organized into general topics that are illustrated with examples of the ways the news has failed to cover the topics properly. The authors address class war, sexism, LGBT rights, gun control (or “massacre prevention,” as they wisely call it), drug policy and foreign policy. The chapters have fantastic titles like “We Know You Smoked Weed in College, Asshole: How the War on Drugs Is Destroying This Country.”

The book is great; when it ended I wished there were more for me to read. I wish they could have taken on even more topics – I feel like there’s enough failure of the media out there on such a wide range of topics that they could write at least one more book, if not two. They point out the problem with presenting “both sides” when there aren’t actually two reasonable sides. A good example of this is climate change. When the vast, vast majority of scientists find truth in something, it doesn’t make sense to have one climate change denier on to debate one scientist. That’s irresponsible. Of course, as Kilkenny and Kilstein point out, scientists (or experts on the issues) are rarely even invited to contribute to the discussions. Instead of the experts on an issue, or those directly impacted by an issue – say, reproductive health – being invited on, you get a panel of older white men. No white women, no women of color, just old white politicians talking about putting an Aspirin between a woman’s knees as effective birth control.

The book is filled with rough language, and includes a smattering of anecdotes from the authors’ lives. Much like their podcast, the book makes me laugh, makes me angry, and motivates me to take action. I read a more diverse array of topics now than I did before I found their podcast. I’ve always been what I’d describe as liberal; now I know that a better term to describe my beliefs is progressive. While some might pass this book off as preaching to the choir, the reality is that while much of what they say might be more radical than the average liberal’s thinking, they back it all up. They provide support for those beliefs that you might have been thinking, but haven’t seen supported when you watch CNN (or MSNBC, because really that station isn’t nearly as liberal as people think).

If you care about politics, journalism, the media, or any of the topics covered in this boo, I strongly urge you to pick it up. And next time you’re on iTunes, or Stitcher, please check out Citizen Radio.

*Feb 28, 2017: Yesterday some very concerning items came out about Mr. Kilstein. Multiple women have shared that he emotionally manipulated and abused them. That is horrifying to hear; Ms. Kilkenny (who split with Mr. Kilstein prior to these revelations) will be continuing Citizen Radio without him.