Reclaiming the F Word: review

Reclaiming the F Word by Catherine Redfern and Kristin Aune is excellent and well worth reading. It provides a round up of feminist activity going on today and shows the sheer diversity of feminism. The authors show conclusively there is still a need for feminism. The laws have changed but culture and people's opinions haven't changed at all. The misogyny has become much more subtle and insidious and therefore much more difficult to fight. It is almost impossible to challenge humour and thus stifling gender stereotypes continue to be propagated - to both men and women.

The book is written in a very down to earth and approachable style with plenty of references to research and other printed and electronic material. The authors analysed a survey to provide some of their material for the book and the survey results are reproduced in an appendix at the end of the book. There are notes to each chapter and a useful list of further reading arranged under the chapter headings.

I found the book fascinating reading and it does highlight the relevance of feminism today and shows how people can become involved. It also analyses the way women are manipulated into looking and dressing a certain way as though their bodies are imperfect in their natural state. Advertising and the media are discussed and the way they portray gender stereotypes analysed. Politics and religion are covered as are work and home life.

It is clear to me from reading this and other recently published books that both men and women need to study their own behaviour and see if they are not making some very dated assumptions about the people they come across every day. The quotes from individuals who have experienced discrimination and prejudice are enlightening - and frightening. I find it shocking that statements made about women in the media and on the Internet pass almost without comment yet if the same things were said about people of colour they would be unacceptable or even illegal. sexism is alive and well in the UK today and this is what everyone needs to challenge as we are wasting the talents and abilities of too many people because of gender stereotypes.

Living Dolls - Natasha Walter

Living Dolls: The Return of Sexism by Natasha Walter is excellent and terrifying reading. She presents a Stepford Wives culture which is somehow sold to young girls as empowerment. To become a prostitute is empowering because you're making money from men - you're in charge. The height of many teenagers' ambition is to become a glamour model or a footballer's WAG. Looks are everything and you have t conform to a particular type of beauty - by fair means or foul. Girls are getting boob jobs for their 18th birthday, young girls are having surgery to make their labia look like the ones they see in porn films. No one will go out with the intention of sleeping with a boy unless they are completely waxed and depilated.

Walter's interviews with teenagers and women in their 20s make tragic reading and show how girls are put in a straight jacket even more than they were prior to the 70s. What is even more tragic are the thoughts of the girls who don't want any part of this culture and who feel completely cut off and ostracized by their peers because of it. Prostitution is seen as empowering and liberating and as something girls choose freely.

The second half of the book demolishes stereotypes which are frequently deemed to be inbuilt and biologically determined. Walter points out that the studies which show little difference in mental functioning between the sexes get no publicity. She also demolishes the few well publicised studies which do show a difference as flawed. She suggests that such books as 'Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus' do more harm than good to the relationships between the sexes.

The media, as the book shows, seem bent on perpetuating old fashioned stereotypes with their emphasis on women's looks, catching a man, worshipping domesticity and turning it into an art form. Women in top jobs and positions of power are declining in numbers as pressure mounts on women to stay at home and be feminine. The section on how high powered political women are lambasted by the media is frightening reading. Appearance and behaviour are all. If women start behaving in a powerful way they very quickly get knocked back. Harriet Harman for instance who if you can actually get accurate details of what she says frequently does make eminent sense. But she is misrepresented in the media - probably because she has no problem with speaking out.

This is a really good, well written and frightening book and I would urge anyone - male or female to read it.