(Part 2) Top products from r/Equality

Book: Blast from the Past by Ben Elton.

Summary: Polly Slade works in the Office of Equal Opportunity for her town council in Britain. Jack Kent is an American military general. When Polly was 17 and a radical feminist and peace activist camped outside Jack's military base in the 1980s to protest war, she had a brief and passionate relationship with Jack. He turns up at her flat mysteriously at 2 in the morning many years later. This happens to coincide with a period in Polly's life where she's being stalked by a former client from the Equal Opportunity office, who she has nicknamed "The Bug."

Polly has retained most of her left-wing, feminist, pacifist views, while Jack is somewhere to the right of Glenn Beck. They have several intense political spats on equality-related issues, from women in the military to infidelity to sexual assault. At the book's climax, it suddenly becomes clear that Jack didn't come to visit either to get Polly back or to pick up old arguments about feminism--he has another purpose in mind, which creates a rather dramatic conclusion.

Review: I found this book an engaging read but was disappointed in how Jack and Polly never really developed beyond caricatures of their political views. Jack seems to exist primarily as a symbol of American imperialism and patriarchy, while Polly is portrayed as a nutty hippie who hasn't grown up since the age of 17, but has learned to hide her fringe views more skillfully and to accept some of the material trappings of capitalism.

That said, even if neither of the main characters is particularly realistic, Elton does manage to make both somewhat sympathetic. Although Jack comes off as a villain in the end, he's not without honor and it's almost possible to feel some sympathy for his plight despite his commission of two rather heinous acts throughout the story. Polly comes off as foolish and impulsive as Jack is single-minded and calculating, but the reader can understand her motivations and sympathize with them.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend this book as an enjoyable piece of fiction--the author has done the "left wing chick with a thing for a right wing guy ends up in scary situation" formula before and with more skill in his previous works. However, from an Equality perspective, it would be a very interesting selection either for individual perusal or for a book group or school class to discuss. It opens with a particularly poignant passage on the plight of individuals Polly labels "Sad White Men" who are claiming reverse discrimination and seeking her help, which she provides despite knowing no matter how many lawsuits they file, all they'll get is a lecture on how society at large benefits from positive discrimination on behalf of minorities. Toward the end of the book, a good point is made about political correctness in hiring and promotions, while Polly says a few particularly affecting words about the nature of rape.

Overall, I'd give it only three stars, yet would recommend it particularly for situations where an opportunity exists to discuss the book with someone of differing political views.

Privilege, Power, and Difference by Allan Johnson.

I suck at summaries, so here's the description from Amazon: "This brief book is a groundbreaking tool for students and non-students alike to examine systems of privilege and difference in our society. Written in an accessible, conversational style, Johnson links theory with engaging examples in ways that enable readers to see the underlying nature and consequences of privilege and their connection to it. This extraordinarily successful book has been used across the country, both inside and outside the classroom, to shed light on issues of power and privilege."

That looks good, I'll have to pick it up.

I would also recommend Good Will Toward Men by Jack Kammer, in a similiar vein.

You can pick up a used copy for only a penny.

>When a legal distinction is determined ... between night and day, childhood and maturity, or any other extremes, a point has to be fixed or a line has to be drawn, or gradually picked out by successive decisions, to mark where the change takes place. Looked at by itself without regard to the necessity behind it, the line or point seems arbitrary. It might as well be a little more to one side or the other. But when it is seen that a line or point there must be, and that there is no mathematical or logical way of fixing it precisely, the decision of the legislature must be accepted unless we can say that it is wide of any reasonable mark.

–Oliver Wendell Holmes, quoted from here

I believe that gives some perspective on this situation. Yes, there may be an apparent contradiction with the law. However, because a written rule can't precisely cover all possible situations in the world, our legal system may use discretion when applying rules to specific events.

In that way, you may see that the contradiction isn't as blatant, but rather an exposure of the way our system works.

I'm not quite willing to take the author of this article at her word that the book is nothing more than smut. I've seen other books treated this way, where folks call for protests and challenges on any YA lit where teenagers acknowledge the existence of sex or drugs. (My own take on that particular controversy is here.)

I also wonder how much all the veiled accusations of the author being a perv are due to him being a male. I don't remember folks talking about how they needed to keep Judy Blume (the person, not her books) away from their kids.

That said, this doesn't seem to be a particularly good book. I've seen the author's other book, Spanking Shakespeare, at the bookstore before, but the only thing it really had going for it was that it had a little more appeal to young men than most of the books in its genre.

you don't have the first clue on the matter, do you?
here's a book, read it:

http://www.amazon.com/Promises-Can-Keep-Motherhood-Marriage/dp/0520241134

Here's another perspective, also published 2006:



http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0143038702/ref=cm_rdp_product

http://www.amazon.com/Castration-Celebration-Jake-Wizner/dp/0375852158/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1241108752&sr=8-1

Warren Farrell, specifically The Myth of Male Power and Why Men Earn More.

>Gender roles are different from society to society and therefore not innate.

This is ideological rhetoric from gender-studies academia that contradicts years of research in neurology, biology, and psychology.

There are "male brains" and "female brains" with differing abilities and preferences, and any individual's brain may exist on a continuum between either extreme.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_humans

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14685-gender-differences-seen-in-brain-connections.html

http://www.education.com/reference/article/Ref_Gender_Differences/

http://www.amazon.com/Sex-Brain-Biological-Differences-Between/dp/0140263489

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/11/031105064626.htm