christyyy's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
fast-paced
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Sexual harassment, Emotional abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, and Domestic abuse
rachelg8489's review against another edition
5.0
Jaclyn Friedman and Jessica Valenti's earlier anthology, Yes Means Yes, was one of those books that I encountered at the right moment for it to be absolutely formative to my feminist awakening. A decade later (and an internship for and later friendship with Jaclyn), Believe Me made me think about similar topics in new and exciting ways, and I'm brought back to my college-age self, holed up in her dorm room reading those earlier essays. I especially recommend the essays from Moira Donegan and Sady Doyle, but they're all fantastic, and we're all lucky to have this anthology in 2020.
hnagle15's review against another edition
"People are, and must be, more than their lowest moments. But beyond that they must also be empowered to interpret what had happened to them."
This was really well done. I thoroughly enjoyed the essays within this collection and am grateful to the authors for sharing their experiences.
wombatjenni's review against another edition
5.0
Believe Me is an intense read. All of its essays, written by a wide variety of authors, illustrate issues that touch everyone when we don't trust women, from advancements in health care to the pipeline from domestic abuse/sexual harassment to school shootings. Much of it is sad in hindsight: we can look back at reports and political movements by women, and go, "oh, I guess they were right back then..." It's an investigation into what it means to be believed, and who gets to be believed, in the United States particularly. As much as there is a backlash against "cancel culture," one of the authors reminds us that it took over 80 women until anyone took accusations against Harvey Weinstein seriously enough, whereas his word against the women was enough for a long time.
What I found remarkable was how such a short book has all these essays civilly debate among each other: as an example, one author addresses the issue of how white men are often voted in to leadership roles in anti-harassment and anti-rape organization, and the well-intentioned approaches often focus not on preventing harassment or rape by incentivizing good bystander ("see something, say something") behavior and building a safe environment, instead focusing on how the victim can more easily report issues after the fact. This essay is followed by a man writing about his experiences doing anti-sexual-harassment work, and how it absolutely sucks that often, the only way to make people believe women is to have a white man say the same thing.
Likewise, the book contains criticism of white feminism, which often forgets to take into account dangerous sexism combined with racism that Black women face, such as that resulting in devastating numbers of Black women not being treated appropriately by doctors - studies show, that medical professionals believe (note: believe, not "have evidence of") that Black women can handle pain better than White women, and that they also exaggerate their symptoms more. This is a deadly combination. Samantha Irby's essay on finally getting diagnosed with Crohn's disease is both heartbreaking and in her usual style, humorous: Irby, with no history of drug abuse, was asked by her doctor whether she was just exaggerating her symptoms to get pain killers, only to sheepishly attend to her once the MRI showed that she truly had a problem.
A very illuminating, engaging read.
What I found remarkable was how such a short book has all these essays civilly debate among each other: as an example, one author addresses the issue of how white men are often voted in to leadership roles in anti-harassment and anti-rape organization, and the well-intentioned approaches often focus not on preventing harassment or rape by incentivizing good bystander ("see something, say something") behavior and building a safe environment, instead focusing on how the victim can more easily report issues after the fact. This essay is followed by a man writing about his experiences doing anti-sexual-harassment work, and how it absolutely sucks that often, the only way to make people believe women is to have a white man say the same thing.
Likewise, the book contains criticism of white feminism, which often forgets to take into account dangerous sexism combined with racism that Black women face, such as that resulting in devastating numbers of Black women not being treated appropriately by doctors - studies show, that medical professionals believe (note: believe, not "have evidence of") that Black women can handle pain better than White women, and that they also exaggerate their symptoms more. This is a deadly combination. Samantha Irby's essay on finally getting diagnosed with Crohn's disease is both heartbreaking and in her usual style, humorous: Irby, with no history of drug abuse, was asked by her doctor whether she was just exaggerating her symptoms to get pain killers, only to sheepishly attend to her once the MRI showed that she truly had a problem.
A very illuminating, engaging read.
conunhumdrum's review against another edition
4.0
An interesting collection of essays on gender based violence and women’s place in society. Very pleased to see essays on trans rights, sometimes missing from supposedly feminist books. A good overview of essays and introduction to lots of different authors you may not have heard of before, enabling you to spiral even further down your TBR pile.
mohawkm's review against another edition
5.0
This is a high quality selection of essays - both because it has a wide variety of writers who all are quite skilled with tackling the subject area, and because each focused on how to make the world better and/or what the world would look like if we believed women. Two standout essays here are from Soraya Chemaly and from Tahir Duckett. If you read nothing else, read these two, as they cover really hopeful ground with a world full of consent and respect and how to get there.
lilydoyle6's review against another edition
4.0
This was a well-put together book of essays on believing women and how it can change the world for the better. It's not a surprise that believing women is a key to improving society and we've (almost) always are on the right side of things. In my unbiased opinion as a woman, anyway.
But this book of essays was great. The authors did a wonderful job of getting essays from diverse backgrounds and viewpoints. I felt like a lot of perspectives were included, some of which I hadn't considered.
I will say I had hoped it wouldn't fully be centered around the Brett Kavanaugh "trial" but I understand how this event was a major catalyst for the movement. I initially thought it'd be about believing women in general, throughout history, versus how it's important after this specific event occurred. But in order to capture readers I think it was an important stylistic choice, which doesn't take away from the effectiveness or impact of the book.
tl;dr: read this book...everyone read it. It's worth a read. Also inspires some anger and frustration and the never ending question of when will the justice system & society catch up and start believing women?
But this book of essays was great. The authors did a wonderful job of getting essays from diverse backgrounds and viewpoints. I felt like a lot of perspectives were included, some of which I hadn't considered.
I will say I had hoped it wouldn't fully be centered around the Brett Kavanaugh "trial" but I understand how this event was a major catalyst for the movement. I initially thought it'd be about believing women in general, throughout history, versus how it's important after this specific event occurred. But in order to capture readers I think it was an important stylistic choice, which doesn't take away from the effectiveness or impact of the book.
tl;dr: read this book...everyone read it. It's worth a read. Also inspires some anger and frustration and the never ending question of when will the justice system & society catch up and start believing women?