a ranty review about a ranty book
Sep. 8th, 2008 08:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
snugglekittySo, yesterday I finished reading Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity by Julie Serano for my queer book group.
I really really wanted to like this book. I expected to like this book. I was enthused by the cover and by the reviews it's been getting. I was predisposed to assume that I would like a book picked out by the awesome book group moderators. Alas, I was doomed to disappointment.
This book is more or less a manifesto. Serano has a lot of political ideas and isn't afraid to share them. She dips into many pots - the media, academia, the sciences, personal experience, anecdotes from friends - in pursuit of her thesis: that "traditional sexism" (oppression of women by men) is far less of a problem than "oppositional sexism" (our society's tendency to make 'male' and 'female' into mutually exclusive categories with no overlap) and making assumptions about other people's genders.
There were a few things I liked about this book. I found Serano's model of intrinsic inclinations (the idea that our sex and gender identities, along with sexual orientation, are neither purely nature or nurture, but based on deep-seated inclinations that are hard to deny) compelling. I also really liked the way she talked about media portrayals of transsexuals. She pointed out that the media is more or less obsessed with showing MTFs putting on makeup, and argues that this is a way of demonstrating the artificiality of trans genders. I feel she has a good point there, and was considering that the other main demographics that seem to be shown putting on makeup a lot in the movies are sex workers of various stripes, older women, and teenage girls trying to be badass. More examples of artifice and genders we're trying to say are fake, I believe.
Oh, this book has some problems. I hardly know where to begin.
My objections fall into a few categories:
- Poor editing. I realize that this is a chronic problem with non-mainstream nonfiction and it comes up a lot with kinky and pagan writing as well. But still, an editor could have made this book seem a little bit less fanatic without losing any major points. And "cannot be underestimated" does not mean that something is important. I found that one mistake in at least three places in the book.
- Excessive repetition and privileging of her own position. Every major argument she makes in this book is repeated at least four times, often with the same "evidence" given to back it up. I noticed many uses of words like "clearly" and "obviously" where I felt that nothing was clear or obvious. An example of this is that she claims that trans women are the most oppressed and stigmatized of any sexual minority. Whether true or false, stating things so... dramatically did not advance her argument with me. Although, again, I was predisposed to agree with her because I am a supporter of trans rights, putting things so over the top made me not want to agree with her.
- Widening the gap. Serano complains that cissexual genders are privileged over transsexual genders - this is undoubtably true in our society and I would never deny it. But writing a book which basically assumes that all cissexuals are ignorant and bigoted and need to get out of the way of trans people is not something I feel will help anyone see that we're all just people in the end. An example of this is the chapter on art and academia, in which she writes that cissexual people should stop studying and writing about transsexual people. And white people shouldn't write about black people, and straights shouldn't write about gays, and men shouldn't write about women... down with fiction! Memoirs only!
- Unsubstantied leaps of logic. At many points in the book I would go from one sentence to another and just say, "WTF??" For example: "Indeed, it has become increasingly common for people who are primarily queer because of their sexual orientation to claim a space for themselves within the transgender movement... cissexual queers now dominate transgender and queer/trans communities." (p 354-355) Um, excuse me? How exactly did we get from some queers being a part of the transgender movement to cissexual queers dominating the trans movement? She cites sources to substantiate the first claim, but not the second. Also, isn't trans an identity category than anyone can choose to be a part of? Isn't the intense stigmatization of being trans, which she spends most of the book talking about, enough to keep people who aren't "really trans" out of the movement? (Just like, if being gay were truly a choice, why would anyone in our society choose to be so judged and oppressed?) I find it an especially odd position given that Serano describes herself as having had a long and winding journey to identify as transsexual and used to identify as genderqueer, and also because she claims that you cannot know how someone really feels about their physical sex without being them. How do you really really know all of those people are truly cissexuals, then? Vulcan mind-melds?
- Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Serano argues simultaneously that transsexuals are made invisible by our society but somehow cissexual people ought to just know about them anyway. "When I come out to people, they often tell me that I am the first transsexual they have ever met. This suggests that most cissexuals never seriously consider the possibility that a certain percentage of the cissexual-appearing people they see every day might actually be transsexual." Well, if they haven't knowingly encountered trans people before, how would they know about them and be aware of their issues, especially in an "oppositionally sexist" society like the one we live in? How does that work, exactly? Similarly, she seems to want cissexual people to simultaneously be magically aware and respectful of transsexual people and their issues and to stay the hell away from them.
- Focusing on the negative. If there are any positive portrayals of trans people in the media, or if there are any transition-managing doctors who aren't totally evil, heck, if anyone in her life has even supported her gender identity or reacted positively when she came out as trans, you wouldn't know it by this book.
Note: I tried to limit the length of this post and just focus on what I thought was most important. Please assume I have more examples than the ones I mentioned above to back up my objections, as well as more objections overall.
Sorry, Serano. I really wanted to like your work, but it just has too many problems, more than I can even list here. One star. And I'm sure that she, or anyone who supports her work, would claim I make these arguments because I'm cissexual and trying to perpetuate oppositional sexism. No. I support the trans movement strongly - I just think that this is a bad book.
This really makes me want to re-read Bornstein or Feinberg or Kaldera as a trans-activism palate-cleanser. I hope the rest of the book group books will be better, though admittedly it's a bit hard to imagine how they could be worse.
I really really wanted to like this book. I expected to like this book. I was enthused by the cover and by the reviews it's been getting. I was predisposed to assume that I would like a book picked out by the awesome book group moderators. Alas, I was doomed to disappointment.
This book is more or less a manifesto. Serano has a lot of political ideas and isn't afraid to share them. She dips into many pots - the media, academia, the sciences, personal experience, anecdotes from friends - in pursuit of her thesis: that "traditional sexism" (oppression of women by men) is far less of a problem than "oppositional sexism" (our society's tendency to make 'male' and 'female' into mutually exclusive categories with no overlap) and making assumptions about other people's genders.
There were a few things I liked about this book. I found Serano's model of intrinsic inclinations (the idea that our sex and gender identities, along with sexual orientation, are neither purely nature or nurture, but based on deep-seated inclinations that are hard to deny) compelling. I also really liked the way she talked about media portrayals of transsexuals. She pointed out that the media is more or less obsessed with showing MTFs putting on makeup, and argues that this is a way of demonstrating the artificiality of trans genders. I feel she has a good point there, and was considering that the other main demographics that seem to be shown putting on makeup a lot in the movies are sex workers of various stripes, older women, and teenage girls trying to be badass. More examples of artifice and genders we're trying to say are fake, I believe.
Oh, this book has some problems. I hardly know where to begin.
My objections fall into a few categories:
- Poor editing. I realize that this is a chronic problem with non-mainstream nonfiction and it comes up a lot with kinky and pagan writing as well. But still, an editor could have made this book seem a little bit less fanatic without losing any major points. And "cannot be underestimated" does not mean that something is important. I found that one mistake in at least three places in the book.
- Excessive repetition and privileging of her own position. Every major argument she makes in this book is repeated at least four times, often with the same "evidence" given to back it up. I noticed many uses of words like "clearly" and "obviously" where I felt that nothing was clear or obvious. An example of this is that she claims that trans women are the most oppressed and stigmatized of any sexual minority. Whether true or false, stating things so... dramatically did not advance her argument with me. Although, again, I was predisposed to agree with her because I am a supporter of trans rights, putting things so over the top made me not want to agree with her.
- Widening the gap. Serano complains that cissexual genders are privileged over transsexual genders - this is undoubtably true in our society and I would never deny it. But writing a book which basically assumes that all cissexuals are ignorant and bigoted and need to get out of the way of trans people is not something I feel will help anyone see that we're all just people in the end. An example of this is the chapter on art and academia, in which she writes that cissexual people should stop studying and writing about transsexual people. And white people shouldn't write about black people, and straights shouldn't write about gays, and men shouldn't write about women... down with fiction! Memoirs only!
- Unsubstantied leaps of logic. At many points in the book I would go from one sentence to another and just say, "WTF??" For example: "Indeed, it has become increasingly common for people who are primarily queer because of their sexual orientation to claim a space for themselves within the transgender movement... cissexual queers now dominate transgender and queer/trans communities." (p 354-355) Um, excuse me? How exactly did we get from some queers being a part of the transgender movement to cissexual queers dominating the trans movement? She cites sources to substantiate the first claim, but not the second. Also, isn't trans an identity category than anyone can choose to be a part of? Isn't the intense stigmatization of being trans, which she spends most of the book talking about, enough to keep people who aren't "really trans" out of the movement? (Just like, if being gay were truly a choice, why would anyone in our society choose to be so judged and oppressed?) I find it an especially odd position given that Serano describes herself as having had a long and winding journey to identify as transsexual and used to identify as genderqueer, and also because she claims that you cannot know how someone really feels about their physical sex without being them. How do you really really know all of those people are truly cissexuals, then? Vulcan mind-melds?
- Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Serano argues simultaneously that transsexuals are made invisible by our society but somehow cissexual people ought to just know about them anyway. "When I come out to people, they often tell me that I am the first transsexual they have ever met. This suggests that most cissexuals never seriously consider the possibility that a certain percentage of the cissexual-appearing people they see every day might actually be transsexual." Well, if they haven't knowingly encountered trans people before, how would they know about them and be aware of their issues, especially in an "oppositionally sexist" society like the one we live in? How does that work, exactly? Similarly, she seems to want cissexual people to simultaneously be magically aware and respectful of transsexual people and their issues and to stay the hell away from them.
- Focusing on the negative. If there are any positive portrayals of trans people in the media, or if there are any transition-managing doctors who aren't totally evil, heck, if anyone in her life has even supported her gender identity or reacted positively when she came out as trans, you wouldn't know it by this book.
Note: I tried to limit the length of this post and just focus on what I thought was most important. Please assume I have more examples than the ones I mentioned above to back up my objections, as well as more objections overall.
Sorry, Serano. I really wanted to like your work, but it just has too many problems, more than I can even list here. One star. And I'm sure that she, or anyone who supports her work, would claim I make these arguments because I'm cissexual and trying to perpetuate oppositional sexism. No. I support the trans movement strongly - I just think that this is a bad book.
This really makes me want to re-read Bornstein or Feinberg or Kaldera as a trans-activism palate-cleanser. I hope the rest of the book group books will be better, though admittedly it's a bit hard to imagine how they could be worse.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-09-08 02:20 pm (UTC)That said? Her thing about the only portrayals of transpeople readily available in the culture being either pathetic or deceptive launched me on a whole new, totally exciting, track in my work. So for that, hat tip to her indeed.
Wondering...
Date: 2008-09-08 02:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-08 02:59 pm (UTC)I agree, the "pathetic" vs. "deceptive" argument was interesting, although as per the usual, she seemed to pick out only examples that supported her thesis, and then ignored the rest... just what she accuses cissexual researchers of doing. Le sigh.
oops.
Date: 2008-09-08 03:45 pm (UTC)Thanks for leaving a comment - it was very validating to hear that someone else in the queer/trans spectrum didn't get much out of the book.
Re: Wondering...
Date: 2008-09-08 03:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-08 04:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-09 12:13 pm (UTC)