Reviews tagging 'Pandemic/Epidemic'

Femmes invisibles by Caroline Criado Pérez

16 reviews

fkshg8465's review against another edition

informative sad fast-paced

4.0

Lots of great points made, and I think it’s a book important for all genders, especially men, to read. There’s a one star review by someone named Carey who made some good critique of the book. So it’s also important to check sources and keep a balanced view. 

For my part, I was having to remind myself that there are lots of men in the world that I like and respect and who have had nothing to do with architecting any of these issues, even if some are guilty of perpetuating them unconsciously. Having grown up in a double patriarchy (Korean family in the US), I too am guilty of this and could’ve benefited from asking more questions.

This was highly relevant to me, for example, as a pianist. I had to give up at a certain point because my hand span was too small. Rather than asking why the pianos couldn’t be made smaller, I assumed the problem was me. Or every time I put on my seatbelt, I have to use an adjuster because the seats and belts are too big for my body. (I really think there’s a huge untapped market for car manufacturers of they’d design and sell cars just for women’s body!!!!, like in the billions!!!!). 

What’s frustrating about books like this - nothing gets done, even though we know better. 😢 Plus, women generally outlive men and in poorer health for all the reasons outlined and more. So we’re also having to live longer in these awful conditions. The unfairness never seems to end…

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Toxic relationship, Blood, Medical content, Trafficking, Grief, Religious bigotry, Stalking, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

maddramaqueen's review against another edition

challenging informative sad slow-paced

3.5

A bit gender essentialist and white feminist for me, but the actual information is interesting and inarguably worth knowing.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny and Sexism

Moderate: Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Toxic relationship, Violence, Police brutality, Medical content, Trafficking, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, Classism, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Minor: Cancer, Genocide, Racism, Self harm, Suicide, and Forced institutionalization

skylerhenson's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful informative reflective medium-paced

3.75

This book made me realize a lot of what I didn’t like in the world was because it was made with men only in mind. In all areas of transportation, healthcare, product design, politics, and even disaster relief efforts. My one critique is that there is not a lot of trans-inclusive language but this book is about the lack of data on AFAB bodies and cis women. 

I had the latest edition that included an epilogue about the Covid pandemic which I appreciated because some lines were harrowing to read from a book published in 2019. Overall, an eye-opening read. I want to read more feminist literature like this 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Misogyny, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Sexual harassment, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Minor: Excrement

khymihr's review against another edition

informative medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Sexism, Sexual violence, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Domestic abuse and Pandemic/Epidemic

zemily83's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Minor: Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Violence, Medical trauma, Classism, and Pandemic/Epidemic

lolasbooks12's review against another edition

challenging informative medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism, Biphobia, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Transphobia, Abortion, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Gaslighting, Sexual harassment, War, Classism, Deportation, and Pandemic/Epidemic

callysutherland's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

4.0

Mandatory reading. In small chunks, so you don't get tooooo angry.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexism

Minor: Ableism, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual violence, Slavery, Violence, Medical content, Trafficking, Medical trauma, Car accident, Abortion, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, War, Classism, and Pandemic/Epidemic

unluckycat13's review against another edition

The author is a TERF, this is a TERF book. Not to undermine the honestly good work and important information in this book, but you can't remove it from the author's views. While it starts out seeming reasonable enough-- I think it's understandable even if not great to not separate sex and gender-- the author eventually begins to build her argument into women being an immutable biologically separate organism with most things in life attributed purely to biology. Of course there's no proof of this because of the data gap. The studies will surely show she's right though, as they always say. 

The book does start out acknowledging queer and disabled people, and it does talk about other countries with a non dismissive and non bigoted attitude, however the author is very quick to paint groups of people (such as western women, or British women) with a singular brush. Despite admitting that the so called standard male doesn't represent men in general, she's very argumentative in favor of a standard female model. It's hard to untangle her personal views on sex and gender from the rest of the book and the more you begin to think about it, the worse it gets. 

I would generally not recommend this book, and while it is a nice organization of some studies I have heard most of them before elsewhere. 

Being a book about sexism, you can expect a TW warning for basically literally every topic, albeit only passingly. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Ableism, Chronic illness, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Hate crime, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Police brutality, Medical content, Trafficking, Mass/school shootings, Medical trauma, Stalking, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Sexual harassment, and Pandemic/Epidemic

billie_churchill's review against another edition

challenging informative slow-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Sexism, Medical trauma, and Classism

Minor: Ableism, Death, Domestic abuse, Genocide, Infertility, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Medical trauma, Abortion, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Sexual harassment, and Pandemic/Epidemic

lucyrudd's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Domestic abuse, Genocide, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Medical content, Abortion, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, War, and Pandemic/Epidemic