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A review by angogoblogian
Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism by Mary Daly
4.0
So, I absolutely devoured this book. I think I read it in such a sprint because the meat of this book was really about ills of patriarchal society I already knew about - FGM, footbinding, etc. I was hoping to come away with something new, something I could take home with me, but it never really amounted to that, for me personally.
I had already read "The Myth of Mental Illness" by Thomas Szasz earlier this year, and Daly incorporated a lot his themes into one of the more controversial elements of this book - her derision of therapuetic practice, or "mind-gynecology." It's a bitter pill to swallow, but I'm glad she said it.
I think Daly is still too far ahead of her time and unfortunately, it seems current feminists are not welcoming to her ideas due to the silencing and deplatforming of second wave feminists who do not adhere to current gender politics, ie. transgenderism (or, in Daly's day, transsexualism). If any of today's feminists read this book, they will see right through today's gender politics and understand it is just a reiteration of the same thing Daly, her contemporaries, and our foremothers had to deal with - a whitewashing of our feminist history, a way to disconnect us from our past and further divide and suppress our movement.
I do encourage all women to read this book, not because I think they'll agree or because I think it's unflinchingly good, but because it's necessary for us to hear each other out. It's also a good bit of fun, too, if you like stuff that's a little 1970s-era acid trippy.
I had already read "The Myth of Mental Illness" by Thomas Szasz earlier this year, and Daly incorporated a lot his themes into one of the more controversial elements of this book - her derision of therapuetic practice, or "mind-gynecology." It's a bitter pill to swallow, but I'm glad she said it.
I think Daly is still too far ahead of her time and unfortunately, it seems current feminists are not welcoming to her ideas due to the silencing and deplatforming of second wave feminists who do not adhere to current gender politics, ie. transgenderism (or, in Daly's day, transsexualism). If any of today's feminists read this book, they will see right through today's gender politics and understand it is just a reiteration of the same thing Daly, her contemporaries, and our foremothers had to deal with - a whitewashing of our feminist history, a way to disconnect us from our past and further divide and suppress our movement.
I do encourage all women to read this book, not because I think they'll agree or because I think it's unflinchingly good, but because it's necessary for us to hear each other out. It's also a good bit of fun, too, if you like stuff that's a little 1970s-era acid trippy.