Reviews and Comments

I feel like the chapters in Part 4 are all "end chapters," so I feel like I've read the same thing more than a few times.

It's... frustrating again. I'm not a fan of the way an intersex character is being handled, even if the bigotry isn't out of place for cops in 1928 (or honestly... even today). But again, it's just... weird. The amount of times that Greenwood has to let you know that this person is ~strange~ is just fucking obnoxious.

An author can present bigotries without having to perpetually remind the audience of them. We're not goldfish. And even if Greenwood has characters correcting others' bad behaviours... It's still just... so much all the time?

Something that bothers me about Greenwood is that her writing would be at home as having been produced simultaneously to early Agatha Christie, and even Christie was less likely (not unlikely, because she most certainly did) to use various epithets or certain racist phrasings with the readiness that Greenwood does... and those things really detract from the story.

Because I skipped books in the series, this is the first time that I encountered the characters of Lin Chung and Li Pen, and... Can I just say that this is such an odd naming conventions for Chinese men? It's mostly the double-surname problem all over again, especially since both men are referred to in formal settings as "Mr Lin" and "Mr Li," while Phryne refers to Lin Chung as "Lin" in more intimate settings (and he uses her personal name).

There are also narrations that include phrases like "an oriental hold" (for Li Pen being able to hold a dangerous and fighting man) and having the narration refer to Lin Chung as "the Chinese." It'd be one thing if a character said it (still not great), but why does the narration need to continually remind us that he's Chinese? I know he is. I haven't forgotten.

And all of that really just makes it frustrating to read, even if the story is largely well-constructed and engaging. There's no reason for the narration to remind me of things, especially if there are going to be pieces of dialogue where Phryne is correcting people for their racism (even if done in ways that feel strange but could be forgiven for their early 20th century landed gentry sort of setting).

There's a lot of parts where I'm kind of struggling with the history as it's presented or included. Sure, Feinberg gives citations, but... the materials ze chose to cite don't always do it and require a lot of hunting... and some of those things are bits where I don't know that I'd entirely include it? Like this bit about a rooster who was supposedly tried for laying an egg in the fifteenth century.

I think I like this book even more than the others in this series, which are also books that I adore. This one has a bit of a clever solution, even if some of the clues start lining up a bit early. If you're not reading it to solve it, it's not going to be overtly obvious what's happening and what machinations are taking place.

I also found that there were a lot of interesting philosophical conversations taking place, which I found quite interesting. They weren't overly long or verbose, and they also fit quite neatly into the narrative without bogging it down. Each of them felt exactly like how someone thinking of a problem would vocalise their random thoughts.

I wish the questioning the Feinberg presents got more attention, especially because those questions feel like they're being drowned out by the intended discussion of Ancient Greece (something that makes me bristle for the failure of a lot of people to really understand the dynamics happening there) and then a random discussion of Ancient Rome. The following is an example of questions (as statements) that appear at the end of Chapter 7:

As I began to write this chapter, I thought about how the past has been interpreted only from the standpoint of women and men, without taking transgender, bigender, transsexuality, or intersexuality into account.

This is worth considering! We do need more lenses on history, to ask different questions and explore them. And much of our historical work, as it's told, simply doesn't do that.

Here's another example! These are questions that we still need people to deal with today (regarding drivers licensing and passports):

Why am I forced to check off an For an M on these documents in the first place? For identification? Both a driver’s license and a passport include photographs! Most cops and passport agents would feel insulted to think they needed an M or an F to determine if a person is a man or a woman.

But then it weaves right back to an somewhat adequate history of Ancient Rome...

I find these things far more engaging, personally. And I'd like to see them tied into the histories better, especially the latter point about documentation and laws.

While I appreciate that this book is largely Leslie Feinberg learning about hirself via hir exploration of history, I find that its subtitling (Making History from Joan of Arc to...) creates an expectation that isn't met or explored. I do think this is a valid critique, regardless of how many people I've encountered keep telling me that it being "a history" isn't the point... except it kind of is? And if it wasn't, then the subtitle should've been something else entirely.

There are parts where it is frustrating because even I know they're not entirely true. For example, when discussing how patriarchy came to be, zie highlights that it was men who domesticated large herd animals (no citation) and ignores how there are cultures where women, children, and the elderly engaged in the role of animal husbandry (of Steppe Nomads, we know that those three categories took care of and herded sheep).

I'm also not fond of hir analysis around Joan of Arc. It may well be true, and I do see Joan of Arc as having a role within trans history (and the history of the development of gender within specific contexts)... but there are things that Feinberg also includes in hir short exploration that make me ask further questions... because I think they needed to be asked, as the exploration makes some broad assumptions that I don't find myself entirely comfortable with (because I lack context on certain aspects of both Joan of Arc as an individual and the peoples of Lorraine and their social organisation).

I much more appreciate the memoir-esque elements of this book, and I wish more of the historical detailing was through that lens alone.

Regardless of how a person might feel, this book is written in a way that is super engaging. The original version is much better in this regard because its sometimes raw structure leads to more concise and clear discussion, even if the phrasing is "off."

The revision often gets bogged down in trying to be more correct for modern sensibilities; I still think that the book should've been left as it was but incorporated new essays in different sections or footnotes to elaborate. I also find the modernising of the text—swapping older pop culture people or items for newer ones—is bizarre and makes the text sound really confused when Bornstein chooses not to update the text for modern sensibilities.

A lot of stuff Bornstein wrote about still rings true, and I kind of find that a little disappointing. Perhaps I find it more disappointing because people constantly talked about how the world is better! And how accepting people were! And... now we're watching that so-called acceptance slide back to where it all was before because too many people got complacent and too many people wanted to assimilate instead of keep going, keep questioning, keep pushing for better lives.

Anyway, if you read this... I'd say either read the original version or read them side-by-side so you can compare the major changes and additions. I didn't enjoy the writing in the revised version nearly as much. It just wasn't as punchy, and it felt watered down.

Chapter 15 is the play Hidden: A Gender that Bornstein wrote. It's... not my cup of tea, as it's written. I see some interesting aspects that can be developed on, but it's not really something I always like. Though, I like this one line that's in Act II, Scene 1:

Gender is the feeling that you need to be one or the other. Gender is the need to belong—it doesn’t matter to what. Gender is the need to fit in, be part of something. All the rest is marketing. Sales. Public Relations.

This is a rough estimation of how I've felt for a long time, trying to figure it all out, realising I'm agender, and then... not really caring which one I fit into.

Even though it's couched in the language of the 1990s (in the original), I like seeing the idea that being trans doesn't have to be just one thing. I've pulled a phrasing change from the revision ("pre-transition person"), since that is one of the changes that I don't mind:

Through it’s insistence and fierce maintenance of the man/woman dichotomy, the culture puts the pre-transition person in the position of needing to say a permanent good-bye to one gender, and then and only then say hello to another. While that good-bye/hello is certainly an option, this culture is making it the only option. A viable solution to such a “choice” is to disentangle oneself long enough from the culture or individual presenting the two alternatives, so that you can explore some other options.

While this is a thing that I know and have talked with friends about for a long while, it's still nice to come across it in a text because of how... uncommon it feels to see and hear other people recognise.

There are a lot of points like that, which do make me appreciate aspects of this book. Like, another is:

Doing away with gender is key to the doing away with the patriarchy, as well as ending the many injustices perpetrated in the name of gender inequity. There is no gender inequity that doesn’t first assume there is gender—and only two genders at that. Gender inequities include sexism, homophobia, and misogyny.

I very rarely encounter anything that even looks remotely gender abolitionist, so I find it interesting to see something that looks that way here (or can be read that way). I also like the recognition that a lot of injustices and bigotries are interconnected as a result of gender (as one form of analysis, at least).

There are some interesting bits about 'being the fool' (like a jester or a trickster), especially as Bornstein sees them as the people who question society. As a weirdo who has always been interested in jesters, especially in modern fictional portrayals, I find this to make sense.

Though, it does come off a bit clunky and confusing. The original version is quippy and amusing, even if not entirely something I agree with. The new version struggles under both a call back to Bornstein's work on I Am Cait (with Caitlyn Jenner), where it feels more sinister than it's probably intended as a result of today's political landscape:

I had the great good fortune to accompany Caitlyn Jenner and company as a regular cast member of E! TV’s reality series I Am Cait. It was one of the very best times of my life. I remember at one point, Caitlyn Jenner was defending her right-wing politics to several of us, saying that if a right-winger ever ended up as president of the United States, she, Caitlyn, would be in a great position to be that president’s trans ambassador. Well, that made me think. And think. And think. And about a week later, I announced my solidarity with CJ, saying I would be in a great position to be that Republican president’s court jester.

It doesn't help that, currently, a refusal to even stand with trans people is a bipartisan affair (pretty much anywhere). It doesn't help that the modern Republicans are overt fascists (and were even in 2016, when the new version of this book was published).

If anything, it makes reading the new version feel incredibly disappointing.

This book is rubbish, and it's nothing short of constantly reinforcing the so-called masculinity it claims it wants to dismantle.

I've effectively made an essay for each chapter in the book comments here, but I just... I cannot with this book. I have always wondered why it is that I see so many abusive men, especially abusive men who claim to be "progressive" or "radical leftists" or "anarchists," promoting it and utilising it in their screeds that support abuse apologia... And now I know why.

Every claim comes with zero references or citations. When she does cite someone, they're frequently conservative white men. One of them was a former associate and romantic partner of Ayn Rand (Nathaniel Branden), while two others were Oprah-promoted "therapists" who comment on the attractiveness of their patients (Terrence Real and John Bradshaw)... Or another interesting one is Michael Kimmel (but that's because he later resigned from his role in a gender equality campaign group after being accused of sexual harassment in 2018—she probably didn't know about this one in 2004, but it's still an interesting pattern of the men she cites). There's also Gary Zukav, who once wrote that dolphins are killing themselves and giving themselves sicknesses because they're exhausted (not that humans are, you know, fucking up their environment).

Chapter 11. I'm finished. I don't want to write a long review, so I'm probably going to keep the essay to the chapter comment.

This chapter... I have a headache. She keeps doing this thing where, though she sometimes will critique the hyperfocus of US culture on the nuclear family, she places the responsibility for everything squarely within the nuclear family. It's like she can't decide if she wants to critique it (she doesn't in this book) or support it, and she routinely ignores... any aspect of communal child-rearing and communal support of families. It's a bit bizarre, and this is especially true because of her gross fascination with boys always needing male role models (if they don't have them at home, what about communal care? she avoids this conversation, and her work maintains a weird position on the role of parents).

She then drops this paragraph on the reader:

The notion that lesbian women are antimale always proves false when groups of women gather and talk about men. The most vicious man-hating comments are always made by women who are with men and who plan to be with them for the rest of their lives. After forty-nine years of marriage, my mother is angry with our dad. The perfect subordinated wife, now when they are both over seventy years in age, is upset that he is not more emotionally giving. Since she is not a feminist, she does not see that it is a contradiction to expect this old-time patriarch to suddenly give her love. Her anger surprises and enrages him. Mama’s anger masks her fear that any day now she could die without ever feeling loved by the man she has devoted her entire life to pleasing. Like the men who feel that patriarchy’s promise has not been fulfilled, Mama feels that she is left with broken promises, without the reward for performing the subordinate role she was told a good woman should perform.

And I find it to be one of the most unempathetic things I've ever read, especially coming from someone who keeps saying that we need to show real and genuine love (but I guess that real and genuine love is for cis men only, since apparently we can just ignore it in this instance).

Like, first: Why is she just dropping lesbians in here? It's like she's trying to say that lesbians are good, actually, because they don't hate men as much as the stereotype says!

Second: She provides no evidence for this claim. I don't think it's true, honestly. I think this is bell hooks conflating complaints of cis women in heterosexual romantic relationships with cis men who are tired of, well... the stereotypical ways that many men behave. That's not necessarily "man-hating." That's being exhausted and wanting their partner to actually be part of their relationship.

Third: What a weird way to show you have no empathy for your own mother? I don't think this is a contradiction. I think, after 49 years of marriage (as of this book's publication), it's frustration for all she's put up with, for the life she probably feels stuck in and unable to leave, and for the man who has dominated her family for as long as she can remember. Why is her mother not allowed to complain about this? It's so weird.

I also struggle with this paragraph for so many reasons, too:

Many women despair of men because they believe that ultimately men care more about being dominators than they do about being loving partners. They believe this because so many men refuse to make the changes that would make mutual love possible. Women have not proven that they care enough about the hearts of men, about their emotional well-being, to challenge patriarchy on behalf of those men with whom they want to know love. We read self-help books that tell us all the time that we cannot change anyone, and this is a useful truism. It is however equally true that when we give love, real love—not the emotional exchange of I will give you what you want if you give me what I want, but genuine care, commitment, knowledge, responsibility, respect, and trust—it can serve as the seductive catalyst for change. Any woman who supports patriarchy who then claims to either love the men in her life or be frustrated that they do not love her is in a state of denial.

It feels like a disjointed jumble of thoughts that don't go together, but it also just feels like a verbose way of trying to say "if you love them correctly, then they might be able to change." It's hard not to read this as a victim-blaming text, especially because it puts the onus on women (because they "have not proven they care enough about the hearts of men").

Also, this strange assumption that we're all out here reading self-help books? I mean, I'm reading this one, but a lot of people keep portraying it as philosophy or feminist theory... which I disagree with.

Yet another paragraph that is just weird is this one:

Women who want men to love know that that cannot really happen without a revolution of consciousness where men stop patriarchal thinking and action. Because sexist roles have always given women support for emotional development, it has been easier for women to find our way to love. We do not love better or more than men, but we do find it easier to get in touch with feelings because even patriarchal society supports this trait in us. Men will never receive support from patriarchal culture for their emotional development. But if as enlightened witnesses we offer the men we love (our fathers, brothers, lovers, friends, comrades) affirmation that they can change as well as assurance that we will accept them when they are changed, transformation will not seem as risky.

It does precisely the thing I keep complaining about where she starts off with a thought that isn't all that bad (the first sentence) and the swerves hard-right into being like, "You know the men who have been abusive toward you? If you love them genuinely enough, they'll change." It also presumes that because women are afforded more space to have a wider range of emotions... that it makes it easier for them to "find their way into love." That is weird.

Either way, bell hooks really keeps putting the onus for men's emotional development and ability to change... on women. How is that feminist?

And the final paragraph that made me want to headdesk into oblivion:

Time and time again when I struggled to do the work of love with a male partner who was not changing, I was told to give up on him, to kick him to the curb. I was told I was wasting my time. All this negative feedback made me ponder whether healing places exist where wounded males can go where they will not be turned away, especially when positive change is not happening fast or fast enough. Women who have been victimized by men, women who have suffered ongoing hurt at the hands of men, naturally are wisely cautious about the energy that they can expend in the service of helping men heal. Yet there are many women who have been both helped and hurt by men.

This is literally abuse apologia and support for abusers over their victims. It's also nonsensical because it's conflating not changing at all with not changing fast enough.