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A review by snixo048
On Monsters: An Unnatural History of Our Worst Fears by Stephen T. Asma
1.0
I really wanted to like this book as the premise and the topic are great. However, the author began to lose me when he went on a totally unnecessary side bar about how men just have this protective instinct that women don't have and they can't escape (sorry....have you seem a Momma bear)? But I have sloughed through casual sexism for good content and information before. So I persisted.
However, a relatively uncritical chapter on hermaphrodites as monsters (and how the ancient Romans used to drown them) killed it for me. Sure he was kind of saying that this was silly of the Romans, but no. Just no.
To take an already oppressed group (Intersex people....not hermaphrodites) and include them in any way in a book titled "Monsters" is insensitive, shortsighted, heteronormative and perpetuates a dangerous narrative. I suggest visiting http://www.isna.org/ to see why the author totally missed the mark here.
However, a relatively uncritical chapter on hermaphrodites as monsters (and how the ancient Romans used to drown them) killed it for me. Sure he was kind of saying that this was silly of the Romans, but no. Just no.
To take an already oppressed group (Intersex people....not hermaphrodites) and include them in any way in a book titled "Monsters" is insensitive, shortsighted, heteronormative and perpetuates a dangerous narrative. I suggest visiting http://www.isna.org/ to see why the author totally missed the mark here.