Starred review from June 23, 2014
Journalist and activist Penny (Meat Market) combines unsparing autobiography and searing political analysis in her latest book; the result is a powerful feminist polemic that critiques the structure of society. Though she adopts a radical perspective, Penny avoids the usual hectoring that overvalues the politics of the personal, and she makes it clear that, as a feminist, she’s not interested in how women dress or whether they wear makeup. Instead, Penny tackles broad issues of gender and sexuality. The first two chapters provide a masterful analysis of the place of both women and men in society, and later chapters present Penny’s brilliant views on sexuality and “cybersexism.” The author incorporates rich personal narratives that serve as reminders of the injuries inflicted on individuals by the social problems under discussion. The book is chilling and accessible, a majestic treasury of ghost stories that are, in fact, all too real. Penny has given us a feminist book for our time that burns with a wild light and deserves attention. Agent: Juliet Pickering, Blake Friedmann (U.K.)
July 15, 2014
A British columnist and gender activist's gutsy analysis ofhow neoliberal capitalism has taken the "ideals of freedom" and transformedthem into "strategies of social [and sexual] control."The global financial collapse of 2008 revealed that neitherthe market nor the mainstream feminism that claimed to have made inroads intoit was woman-friendly. The violence that accompanied the Occupy movement threeyears later only confirmed the radical inequality that underlay the social,political and economic systems of the developed world. In this book, whichseeks to smash "the machinery" of 21st-century neoliberalcapitalism, New Statesmancontributing editor Penny (Meat Market:Female Flesh Under Capitalism, 2008, etc.) examines the current state offeminism in a money- and power-obsessed world. Drawing on her experiences withanorexia and mental illness, she explores the impact of "good girl" narrativesof perfection on women, who are expected to cultivate their "erotic capital"rather than their talents to succeed both socially and financially. Men, whomthe author sees as plagued by confusion, self-hatred and self-doubt, also sufferunder neoliberal capitalist tyranny. A bisexual woman living and loving on theedges of both British and American cultures, Penny observes that inter- andcross-gender relationships form the basis of the "ritual dehumanization" andobjectification of women by men. Since neither females nor males are free frommisogynist ideology, neither finds true sexual fulfillment or freedom. The onepossible space of liberation is the Internet. Through its emphasis on thewritten word, it allows women the promise of temporary release from the "weightand anxiety" of the female body. Fraught as it is with the visual lures ofpornography and the dangers of bullying and stalking, cyberspace is still aplace where revolutionary new forms of personal, sexual and political networking/organizingcan take place, helping to overcome prevailing sexist social and economicsystems.Spirited, intellectually sexy reading.
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