_kendab's review against another edition
4.0
I bought this book to read the fourth chapter, titled: ”Taking His (Out),” an examination of entitlement as a fundamental function of misogyny. As Martha Nussbaum wrote in the foreword, “misogyny is primarily about the demand that women give support, service, and care.” This book was rigorously written, but apart from the section addressing the specific issue I was interested in, the arguments were more meticulous (and current) than I needed.
beckyschwartz's review against another edition
dark
informative
reflective
slow-paced
5.0
Thoroughly enjoyed this.
gloomyboygirl's review against another edition
4.0
I genuinely think the focus on white women is what dragged this down for me, even if I agreed with her reasoning for her focus and she did a good job touching on more intersectional points when it came up. She succeeded INSANELY well in what she was looking to write, the white-cisness and focus on 2016 election just wasn't exactly what I was expecting or wanting from the book. I think if the introduction made it more clear what the trajectory of the text was, I'd have enjoyed it more. But as it was it was very educational, well-written, and well-researched. It just lacked what I would need to give it a 5 star personally.
mcatsambas's review
3.0
I like that Manne wrote a book to explain what misogyny is and how it operates. She gives many useful examples of how misogyny is used as patriarchy's enforcement mechanism -- like when women withhold goods that men believe they are entitled to (as in the case of society extending outsize sympathy to men accused or convicted of rape), or when women try to take what is traditionally seen as men's for the taking (as in the case of public smears against female politicians pursuing higher office). The problem is that all her points are absolutely BURIED in dense, incomprehensible academic writing. It doesn't have to be this way! I have read plenty of philosophy papers that were written in plain English. There is simply no excuse!
havingsaidthat's review against another edition
5.0
Brilliant, instructive and thoroughly depressing. I got very much convinced by Manne's distinction between sexism and misogyny (the ideology underpinning vs the executive arm of patriarchy), and in particular her point that misogyny, rather than being a failure to see women's humanity, is an expression of (violent) hatred of that humanity which is seen as threatening, destabilizing, emasculating. The language here is that of analytical philosophy which needs some getting used to and can sometimes feel like a bit tedious in its academic rigor. I was very impressed how these analytical tools were applied to examples from politics, public life, literature and film though. Highly recommended.
obscuredbyclouds's review against another edition
1.0
I am baffled by all the rave reviews for this book, and can only conclude that most people did not read this as the work of philosophy it claims to be, but more of general look at misogyny in the world with some socialogical excursions. But Manne does claim to be writing the first analytical philosophical work on misogyny and at the beginning of the book she says she will analyze the term. She barely does that. What little definition there is, is debatable at best: Misogyny is not, as we generally think, a hatred of women but is instead a belief system that is primarily about controlling, policing, punishing, and exiling the "bad" women who challenge male dominance.
Manne gives a lot of examples of people controlling/policing/punishing women for challenging male dominance and other examples of what she believes to be misogyny. Some of them are clear enough (how the law treats rape victims), some of them are rather strange (I think she severely misunderstood or at least misrepresented the first season of Fargo), but they all suffer from beinge extremely 'current'. Manne talks so much about Trump and Clinton and the elections that just four years after publication, this book feels very dated. Maybe a different more general framing would have helped. But dated examples don't make bad philosophy, of course, and I agree that most of her examples show cases of misogyny, but she seems to want to be doing something else then merely point out the existence of mistreatment of women - she wants to show these examples underscore her (non-given) definition of the term, and I don't see how they do. At all.
Although she uses a lot of philosophy jargon (at one point she writes about tollensing a modus ponens and I had to wonder how many non-philosophy versed people had a clue what she meant), taken as a work of analytical philosophy this is extremely poor. It lacks premise, a clear aim and an understandable thesis. Non-fiction books that leave me wondering what the hell they are trying to say, even if they're easy to read from page to page, just infuriate me. If it's philosophy, it's even worse. Tell me what you're doing and what you're trying to argue for. If not, why should I waste my time on you?
One of the few parts where I understand what Manne wanted to argue for was the chapter on humanism. According to her, misogynists don't think of women as "sub-human", like the humanists' approach suggests, but instead of 'all too human'. I'd never really considered this question before, so I was intrigued. However, the way she argues made me laugh and shake my head. She talks about the red army soldiers raping German women in the aftermath of the second world war. Humanism would have you believe that these soldiers didn't consider these women to be human, and that's how they were capable of such cruelty. Manne argues that this can't be true, because if the soldiers considered the women as non-human and as animal-like, they would be engaging in quasi-beastality. That's it. That's the argument. I can't get over how silly it is. First of all: men DO engage in beastality. Second: treating women as sub-human does not mean, the soldiers literally think of these women as a specific animal, just as 'lesser than'. They know their bodies are human, they're not confused about their physicality and their sex organs - just about their essence as equals. It's strange to act is if treating someone according to their "lack of humanity" seriously entailed a misunderstanding about someone's species affilation.
Fans of this book tell me, what new philosophical and feminists insights did this book offer? I'm genuinely curious if they just evaded me. All I saw was a barely-argued for thesis for a definition of a word. But why? Why would misogyny mean what Manne wants it to mean and not how we've been using the word before? Because it's clearly not how we use the word now. It's on her to show us why we should change the usage, and I don't think she's done that successfully at all.
Manne gives a lot of examples of people controlling/policing/punishing women for challenging male dominance and other examples of what she believes to be misogyny. Some of them are clear enough (how the law treats rape victims), some of them are rather strange (I think she severely misunderstood or at least misrepresented the first season of Fargo), but they all suffer from beinge extremely 'current'. Manne talks so much about Trump and Clinton and the elections that just four years after publication, this book feels very dated. Maybe a different more general framing would have helped. But dated examples don't make bad philosophy, of course, and I agree that most of her examples show cases of misogyny, but she seems to want to be doing something else then merely point out the existence of mistreatment of women - she wants to show these examples underscore her (non-given) definition of the term, and I don't see how they do. At all.
Although she uses a lot of philosophy jargon (at one point she writes about tollensing a modus ponens and I had to wonder how many non-philosophy versed people had a clue what she meant), taken as a work of analytical philosophy this is extremely poor. It lacks premise, a clear aim and an understandable thesis. Non-fiction books that leave me wondering what the hell they are trying to say, even if they're easy to read from page to page, just infuriate me. If it's philosophy, it's even worse. Tell me what you're doing and what you're trying to argue for. If not, why should I waste my time on you?
One of the few parts where I understand what Manne wanted to argue for was the chapter on humanism. According to her, misogynists don't think of women as "sub-human", like the humanists' approach suggests, but instead of 'all too human'. I'd never really considered this question before, so I was intrigued. However, the way she argues made me laugh and shake my head. She talks about the red army soldiers raping German women in the aftermath of the second world war. Humanism would have you believe that these soldiers didn't consider these women to be human, and that's how they were capable of such cruelty. Manne argues that this can't be true, because if the soldiers considered the women as non-human and as animal-like, they would be engaging in quasi-beastality. That's it. That's the argument. I can't get over how silly it is. First of all: men DO engage in beastality. Second: treating women as sub-human does not mean, the soldiers literally think of these women as a specific animal, just as 'lesser than'. They know their bodies are human, they're not confused about their physicality and their sex organs - just about their essence as equals. It's strange to act is if treating someone according to their "lack of humanity" seriously entailed a misunderstanding about someone's species affilation.
Fans of this book tell me, what new philosophical and feminists insights did this book offer? I'm genuinely curious if they just evaded me. All I saw was a barely-argued for thesis for a definition of a word. But why? Why would misogyny mean what Manne wants it to mean and not how we've been using the word before? Because it's clearly not how we use the word now. It's on her to show us why we should change the usage, and I don't think she's done that successfully at all.
miguelb's review
5.0
Phenomenal
This is a book that will open your eyes to even things you think you knew and understood. The careful construction and demonstration of the logic here is brilliant and convincing in a way that so few similarly academic texts are to a layperson. Manne is now one of my heroes.
This is a book that will open your eyes to even things you think you knew and understood. The careful construction and demonstration of the logic here is brilliant and convincing in a way that so few similarly academic texts are to a layperson. Manne is now one of my heroes.