Anti-Feminist Press Crows Over Book Celebrating Domestic Abuse, Then Finds Out How Bad It Can Get

[Starry Messenger]

Barf alert, Christina Hoff Summers strikes again.

I had largely ignored the press around a memoir by Alisa Valdes called The Feminist and The Cowboy, which was being slobbered over by the anti-feminist press as some kind of massive truth-telling about the “nature” of men and women, sticking it to those stupid feminists who emasculate men with our bitchy demands to be regarded as people—which means that in relationships, we’re partners instead of as household appliances that provide clean homes, heirs, and sexual release. In the book, Valdes celebrates her boyfriend for forcing her into a submissive role, which she describes as letting go of feminism’s “dreary shroud of lies”* to embrace what she believes is a woman’s natural role, which is one with no autonomy: “We are the vessel. They are the elixir and the funnel. We are the earth. They are the plough and seed.”

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Christina Hoff Summers specifically singled out “taming” as exactly what uppity bitches need in her endorsement of this abuse-is-great-for-women memoir:

An irresistible, post-feminist Taming of the Shrew. Don’t be scared by the premise. This is not a story about a woman relinquishing her identity. Quite the opposite. It is a riveting tale about how a brilliant, strong-minded woman liberated herself from a dreary, male-bashing, reality-denying feminism.

I do not agree with Summers that hating abusers is “male-bashing” nor “reality-denying”. In fact, by conflating all men with abusers, it’s Summers that is the male-basher here. I believe that men are perfectly capable of treating women well—and that doing so not only can be sexy, but is sexier than treating women like trash—but also that reality demonstrates this every day. It’s Summers and her ilk that are male-bashing and reality-denying.

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I didn't post the disturbing passages on the actual abuse, since it could be triggering, but believe me, it is tragic. And not liberating.