Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man

by Susan Faludi

One of the most talked-about books of last year, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Backlash now explores the collapse of traditional masculinity that has left men feeling betrayed. With Backlash in 1991, Susan Faludi broke new ground when she put her finger directly on the problem bedeviling women, and the light of recognition dawned on millions of her readers: what's making women miserable isn't something they're doing to themselves in the name of independence. It's something our society is doing to women. The book was nothing less than a landmark. Now in Stiffed, the author turns her attention to the masculinity crisis plaguing our culture at the end of the '90s, an era of massive layoffs, "Angry White Male" politics, and Million Man marches. As much as the culture wants to proclaim that men are made miserable--or brutal or violent or irresponsible--by their inner nature and their hormones, Faludi finds that even in the world they supposedly own and run, men are at the mercy of cultural forces that disfigure their lives and destroy their chance at happiness. As traditional masculinity continues to collapse, the once-valued male attributes of craft, loyalty, and social utility are no longer honored, much less rewarded. Faludi's journey through the modern masculine landscape takes her into the lives of individual men whose accounts reveal the heart of the male dilemma. Stiffed brings us into the world of industrial workers, sports fans, combat veterans, evangelical husbands, militiamen, astronauts, and troubled "bad" boys--whose sense that they've lost their skills, jobs, civic roles, wives, teams, and a secure future is only one symptom of a larger and historic betrayal.

Genres: Nonfiction, Feminism, Sociology, Gender, Politics, History, Gender Studies

672 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Susan C. Faludi (born April 18, 1959) is an American humanist, journalist and author. She won a Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Journalism in 1991, for a report on the leveraged buyout of Safeway Stores, Inc., a report that the Pulitzer Prize committee commended for depicting the "human costs of high finance".

Faludi was born to a Jewish family in Queens, New York in 1959 and grew up in Yorktown Heights, New York. Her mother was a homemaker and journalist and is a long-time New York University student. Her father is a photographer who had emigrated from Hungary, a survivor of the Holocaust. Susan graduated from Harvard University in 1981, where she wrote for The Harvard Crimson, and became a journalist, writing for The New York Times, Miami Herald, Atlanta Journal Constitution, San Jose Mercury News, and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications. Throughout the eighties she wrote several articles on feminism and the apparent resistance to the movement. Seeing a pattern emerge, Faludi wrote Backlash, which was released in late 1991. In 2008-2009, Faludi was a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. She lives with fellow author Russ Rymer. Since January 2013, Faludi has been a contributing editor at The Baffler magazine in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Christy Hammer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Faludi almost outdid Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women here documenting the way brutal sex-role stereotypes caught up to the XY chromosomes of the species. The "betrayal" is that men thought they'd become....civilized, educated, fine manners, damn - even equal household duties!, but the culture wanted Macho Men. The military demanded it, and the way US society pitted individuals against each other rewarded the tough guy.

I did a workshop on gender stereotypes in an elementary school right outside of Hanover, NH (home of Dartmouth College) so was a mix of professors' and professional-class kids and working-class ones. A father came up to me afterward and loudly hissed "don't go feminizing my boy!", because I discussed cultural expectations that still tracked men into STEM careers and women into the "helping" ones. I even argued that maybe that was a good thing: we tout more female MDs, yet 90% were in five main areas: OB/GYN, Peds, Fam, Psychiatry, Gerontology. No problem, right? Salary five years after internship had men with almost double average salaries, because they went into the "specialities", instead of the "helping" areas. Maybe it's good for society to sex-role stereotype, we have to ask our students?

Faludi hits home on how our culture make men obsess about their physical appearance and shape as much as women some time now. There is terrific Tough Guise: Violence, Media, and the Crisis in Masculinity and I've seen amazing pictures (that don't lie, right?) of the most famous boy's toy "doll", G.I. Joe, where the line of each decades iteration (from the 1960s to the 2000s, as I recall) had Mattel produce the best seller "boy" doll with obvious (and grotesque) larger and bulkier chests and forearms! By the doll of the 2000s it's a wonder as if those soldiers were real they may likely be incapable of bending over to tie their own shoes.... We need men as aggressive robots; violent monsters.

This has precious little to do with sex differences in brain or body, but popular/lay science would have us believe differently.

[Neil Griffin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why did so many white men vote for Donald Trump? Why did they hate Clinton with such a passion? What are all these guys so mad about?

You could do worse than reading this book from the 1990s to see a remarkably consistent thesis driven home by character studies of struggling men. It shows how baby boomers were brought up in a consumerist paradise and told that they would have what their fathers did: a life full of adventure conquering enemies, a well-paying job, and a family to protect, as long as they were loyal and worked hard.

Instead they got Vietnam, corporations laying them off, and a diminished feeling of masculinity, which they blamed on useful scapegoats, like the feminist movement and immigrants.

This books starts off quite strongly. The first 3-4 chapters were fascinating and really brought brought to life these hard-luck men; you could see why they would feel betrayed. One chapter really boiled down all of the white-working-class grievance when laid-off men pontificated on how much better America was back in their father's day. She even interviews somebody who wanted those great times back by ominously yearning for "what he called, variously and approvingly, a 'police state', 'a dictatorship', or a 'controlled environment', a state in which the old 'system' would be reimposed, his status restored, and the reins of authority returned to a benevolent but firm white male management. The racial attitude that he shared with others at the center buttressed a masculinity based on exclusion and privilege."

Keep in mind that that quote is from 1995 or so when she was doing research on this book and that this was a so-called booming economy that was making men feel this way. It's little surprise that these feelings broke out into the mainstream after a horrific recession.

Her men try religion, going to war, working with their hands, working in pornos, losing themselves in sports fandom, writing action books, but no matter what they try, they feel like they are less of a man than their father's generation, since they are playing by the same assumptions and rules that really don't apply to them. There is no longer a common enemy to unite against and the ones they come up with don't quite work the way Nazis did. On top of that, loyalty is a fool's game in modern corporate America, and factory jobs can barely get you a living wage. The men are trapped in an ideology with no easy way out and are therefore susceptible to demagoguery that promises easy fixes and, yes, common enemies to rally against.

Faludi warns us about the trap and discusses solutions to the problem. Perhaps men can start asking hard questions and reach down deep within themselves and see that they aren't so different than feminists after all. They are both trapped in fake gender roles that are impossible to fulfill and are egged on by a consumerist society of marketing that promises them that attaining manhood or femininity is just a purchase away. It will be the toughest battle yet, but what if the struggling man stops looking for easy answers and slips his way out of the trap and instead of judging himself by how many pterodactyls he whacks with his club before dragging them home for his wife to cook, he actualizes himself in a humanist project that transcends gender and thereby would also remove himself as an obstacle in the struggle for female equality.

Or he could just stay bitter, put on a red cap, and try to vote his way into a past that never existed.

[Elana Sztokman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Susan Faludi is brilliant. She is without a doubt one of the most skilled, insightful and nuanced investigative journalists of our time. I would say that her work often crosses over between journalism and anthropology. She has an incredible knack for getting to the heart of the story, for getting people to open up to her and share what's really going on in their lives and cultures. She is the most thorough writer I have ever read -- I mean, she puts guys like Malcolm Gladwell to shame -- and tackles every story from all the angles, each with the same depth and forthrightness. She avoids assumptions and stereotypes, is open to every idea and possibility, and formulates complex, sophisticated analyses that are both intelligent and ethical. She never compromises on her feminism or on her morality, and at the same time she can sit with people of every background and every ilk -- including rapists, megalomaniacs, and marginalized men -- and treat every one like a human being deserving her utmost respect, listening to to every one with patience and sincerity, and bringing out in each one the depth and a vital human story. She is an artist, an artist of society and the human condition.

I want to be Susan Faludi when I grow up. I mean, seriously...

SO I actually read this book years ago, but it has stayed with me and has influenced so much of how I look at society, especially narratives around us regarding men and masculinity. What prompted me to write this review now is the death of Neil Armstrong. Susan Faludi's chapter on Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldridge was heart-wrenching. And it left me completely unable to listen to the rhetoric of space travel the same way again. The idea that it is all driven by this "ornamental masculinity", by image and glitz over substance, is just overwhelming. Once you read Susan Faludi, there is no going back.

And since she wrote this book, nothing has changed in Western society. If anything the culture has gotten worse. Men are now under the patriarchal microscope, too. Not quite as much as women. But still.

Susan Faludi. Brilliant. Just brilliant. If she were to run for president, I would totally vote for her.

[Dr. Marcia Chatelain · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a beautifully written book about masculinity in America. I credit this book with sparking my interest in gender studies and American Studies. Faludi is able to weave seemingly disparate narratives into a compelling story of how industrialization, economic insecurity and little change in gender expectations have hurt both men and women.

[Trevor · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was nearly as good as Backlash. She interviews a wide range of men in America - from Stallone to a group of men who dress as dogs to go to football matches. There is a description of a men's group that put me off the idea of going to a men's group for life. If there was ever a book to show that the feminist revolution is about the liberation of men too - this is it.

[Julie Mickens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Faludi makes her case via storytelling -- anecdotes woven through with history. It's well written and flows; it's not boring sociology or impersonal statistics. I read this way back in 2000 (I think), yet three of the chapter vignettes have stuck with me vividly 15+ years later:

1 - So-Cal lower-middle-class suburbia -- Lakewood, I think -- gone all wrong and rapey
2 - the pathetic yet poignant jerking around of Cleveland Browns fans and the whole Ravens drama
3 - dismay and depression caused by post-Cold War unemployment and status deflation of white-collar defense workers in California.

In these and other journalistic case studies, Faludi draws out her core thesis. If I remember correctly: Since the WWII era, many men's roles in American society went from productive, meaningful work to roles based on status, peacocking and even ornament. A superficial machismo based on nonproductive consumption -- even, in some cases, being an anti-feminist dick -- began to compete with the old-fashioned ideal of the "good provider." True, the "good provider" role had its problems; in practice, it often reinforced so-called "benevolent" sexism. Nevertheless, at least the role was theoretically based on supporting others. In its most ideal form, it was a norm of pro-social contribution and even group solidarity, rather than tenuous individual status-seeking and display. Stoic, not braggy; producing, not consuming.

Obviously, the book's reportage is from the 1990s, but I suspect that Faludi's depiction of middle-aged white-guy frustration and the sulky entitled young manchild would hold up today. The only difference is, there may be less excuse for not having made any adjustments in the intervening 16 years.

I was pretty young when I read it, so a lot of post-WW2 thru '90s American history was new to me; I may or may not find it as rigorous today. Also, I don't remember whether it mostly focused on white folks or if it covered a diversity of experiences, so caveat lector and all that.

At any rate, a persuasive yet sympathetic case from a feminist that hypercapitalism and sexism are bad for men, too.

[Loki · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's an interesting book, and a compassionate one too, but it's ultimately a failure to me. For a book whose title proclaims it to be about a betrayal, it spends very little time on the subject of the betrayers, concentrating instead on the problems of the betrayed. Not that these problems are not real, or worthy of study, just that this is a book about symptoms, not causes. Indeed, even its diagnosis of symptoms is incomplete.

Faludi repeatedly fails to come to grips with the how and why of the title's betrayal. This is a book about two generations of men: baby boomers and gen x-ers. It conspicuously fails to interrogate the men who were these men's fathers and grandfathers, or to ask why they did what they did. It shies away any time it gets close to portraying the true villains, who get to remain mostly faceless corporate and government functionaries, as if downsizing and asset-stripping are merely weather conditions whose cause cannot be guessed at. The fact that, with one exception (rags-to-riches story Sly Stallone) every rich man who appears in this book is shown to be callous and duplicitous apparently fails to register on Faludi, who talks in the conclusion of the men's struggle as being different from the women's primarily in lacking an easily identifiable enemy. On the contrary, the enemy is identified several times in the book, but Faludi apparently fails to recognise him every time.

That said, if you want to read about how the last few decades worth of social and economic trends have affected a (somewhat) representative sample of American men, this is your book. But this is a book that raises questions more than provides answers, and I'd like it a lot more if I didn't get the nagging feeling that the lack of answers is due to a certain unwillingness on the author's part to think too deeply about the questions.

[Cindy Breeding · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once upon a time...

No.

After World War II, American soldiers returned home with a legacy and a dream to pass on to their sons.

Space exploration. Academia. Scientific research. Art.

The American sons built on that legacy. They were a great generation because the DID something. They BUILT something.

Fast forward to the late 20th Century. Men face a new world defined by mergers, acquisitions, stock market bravado that moved money and credit from shell to shell. And they started losing their jobs. Laid off again and again. At the dawn of the 21st Century, American men could reinforce their masculinity and their agency by BEING. Or APPEARING to be something. Suddenly, the system that has always defined women by appearance, by sexiness and celebrity started gobbling up boys and men, who in turn felt castrated.

Instead of looking at the massive corporate paradigm shift that displaced men from farm, from naval shipyard and from the manager's office, we looked at women.

Women were beginning to pass men up. Women were beginning to delay marriage and develop careers. And men felt more listless and cheated forever.

Like "Backlash," "Stiffed" is long and dense. But it puts the responsibility of this great cultural neutering of men where it belongs. It points to the growth of media influence, the ever-growing lust for corporate profits and the notion of masculinity itself as culprits.


"Stiffed" asks for a cool-headed exploration of the major changes in manufacturing and international trade that led to the corporate jettisoning of men from their place as breadwinner. And it succeeds.

[Stephen Cocconi · Rating 4 out of 5]

For men and women alike. Faludi asks a powerful question:"Why haven't men stood up to a cultural stereotype and the culture it supports which is systematically destroying them economically, and by default, emasculating them in the most heinous of manipulations: encouraging them to blame themselves? Her investigation is thorough, actually compassionate and supportive of healthy masculinity, she painstakingly details and profiles the many ways that modern American corporatism has stripped men of their personhood and transformed them into cogs in a machine. Very important read for those who are actually willing to contemplate a deep structural flaw tearing apart the fabric of modern society.

[Todd · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an incredible book. I strongly advise reading it. Faludi, an award winner journalist and feminist, takes a compassionate and honest look into the condition of the American male.

This is a great book for any feminist or minority activist who is inclined to lay the entire burden of the countries problems on the so-called Angry White Male.

The book takes the long view on the problem and traces the roots of the problem back to the second World War and suggests that men are as shaped by society as they are the authors of it. In fact, even the most powerful of men have has as much done to them as they have acted out upon.

She dares to ask the question as to who the "angry white man is" and why exactly is he so angry in the first place.

A good deal of the book focuses on the baby boomers of the post Word War II era and it examines how society made a lot of promises to them and then proceeded to break every one of them.

[Sarah Cooley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Couldn't get through it. Her perspective was so clear from moment 1... And then it went on and on. didn't need to wade thru the whole thing.

[James Murphy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vast changes have occurred to the societal roles of American men since World War II. Because she sees those changes as resulting in a curtailing of male status, Susan Faludi considers them to be a betrayal. Most of her argument can be boiled down to a loss of economic authority by no longer being sole breadwinners and to the loss of an authoritative father or father figure.

The period immediately following the war and into the 1950s she calls the "era of the boys" and writes that it was marked by the strong father figure in our culture. Father Knows Best and Leave It to Beaver are her 2 examples. But it's downhill from there. One problem was industrial cuts and the loss of jobs overseas so that fathers who'd lost work lacked the means to pass down a strong sense of workplace values to sons. Other significant milestones were the Vietnam War which she says fits her premise as fathers not providing sons with a war they could win. And in that war the lack of parental guidance morphed into weak military leadership and created the conditions for My Lai. Television's triumphant ascendency as the arbiter of professional sports reduced the importance of the fan at the ballpark and stadium. The message is repeated time after time in chapters detailing troubled, devalued men of one kind or another. She writes about Christian evangelism, the Spur Posse boys of Lakewood, California who earned status by scoring sexual points, and ends with the porn film industry where the male star has become diminished because the focus is on the female and because the male is basically a stand-in for the viewer. Along the way she explains at length why Buzz Aldrin and Sylvester Stallone are unhappy. Faludi's conclusion is that the modern American male is searching for ways to be a man in a fatherless landscape.

I suppose this an example of what's called the new journalism. In part, I think, because Faludi embeds herself in her story through research and active observation. It's a big book physically and tries to cover a lot of ground. But it's loosely structured and tends to be a little out of focus at times. Still, I think it's a book that may be important. My own uncertainty about her subject matter probably stems from my abrupt immersion in the material for the 1st time and by the spontaneity with which I read it--I literally plucked the book from a shelf. Neither believing nor disbelieving, Faludi has me thinking. I appreciate the new perspectives while reserving my blanket acceptance.

[maha]

مع أني لم ابتدأ بقراءة الكتاب، فقد قرأت مقاطع قصيرة منه في ورقة.

Hurt So Good: Fight Club, Masculine Violence, and the Crisis of Capitalism - Lynn M. Ta
http://michael-miller.wiki.uml.edu/fi...

وكلا المصدرين يتحدثان عن تحول معنى الرجولة في المجتمع الأمريكي(التغيير يحصل في كثير من الدول الغربية المتمدنة أيضا)، حيث تركت الساحة لاعادة تعريف وتشكيل الأدوار الجندرية التقليدية في حقبة ما بعد النسوية.

***
نحن العرب الذين نعيش في المجتمعات الذكورية لا تزال أذهاننا حية بالصور التقليدية لما لما تعنيه الرجولة، وقد تظل ذاكرة الاخرين في المجتمعات الغربية تحمل صورا من نوستالجيا قديمة (بطل طويل عريض بعضلات يقوم بكسب العيش للاسرة وتستند عليه المرأة) مع أن صور الرجولة القديمة ما زالت تعاد الى الحياة في المجتمع الغربي عبر قصص التاريخ وديزني
المصدر: Tough Guise: Violence, Media & the Crisis in Masculinity
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYrADb...
وربما الحروب الامريكية المفتعلة أيضا؟


عموما، أرى القراءة في موضوع تغير الرجولة مهم لنا، فهو يعكس ابعادا للتغيرات التي اثارتهاالحركة النسوية في تغيير أدوار الرجال ومعنى الرجولة. القراءة في هذا الموضوع لا يجب ان تكون لتعزيز وضعنا الحالي ومعاداة النسوية، ولكن لفهم كل ما مر به المجتمع الغربي الذي مر وفرغ من النسوية (بينما تزال الحركة في بداياتها عندنا)

***

هذه أفكاري المبدئية السريعة حول موضوع الرجولة المفقودة ما قبل قراءة الكتاب

***

في عام 1999، شهد المجتمع الأمريكي نجاح فلمين، أحدهما كان
American Beauty
والاخر فلم
fight club
كلاهما كانا متمحوران على فكرة الرجولة المفقودة في المجتمع الأمريكي الحالي،
قد يسأل البعض: "الى أين ذهبت الرجولة؟" لعبا على صور الرجولة القديمة، وقد يسأل البعض الاخر: "الى ماذا تحولت الرجولة؟" كناية عن أن الرجولة ليست شيء ثابت، بل تتغير مع الزمان والمكان (هذا، ان تجاهلنا فكرة المساواة التامة بين الجندرين بحيث لا يكون هناك فرق بين ما يجب ان يكون عليه الرجل وما يجب ان تكون عليه المرأة)

***

شاهد المقطع التالي من فلم
fight club
http://www.criticalcommons.org/Member...

، نجد في المقطع صورة مبالغة لمآل الرجولة في أمريكا الحالية: القدرة على امتلاك اشياء تشترى (الاستهلاكية).. (وأجد اصداء ذلك عندنا في المثل القديم: الرجال ما يعيبه الا جيبه).. الا أن المقطع يشير الى تحول هذا الرجل عبدا لثقافة الاستهلاكية، واختيارهم لانشغاله بالأثاث (وهو تخصص النساء في مجتمعنا مثلا، لاحظ ان كتالوج ايكيا في السعودية مكتوب بصيفة تخاطب المرأة، بعكسه في الكويت الذي يخاطب الرجل) انشغال جاك بالاثاث يؤكد تهشم دور الرجل التقليدي "ورجولته" ليتحول الى الدور الذي من المفترض أن تنشغل به المرأة.

"Like everyone else, I had become a slave to the IKEA nesting instinct. If I saw something like clever coffee tables in the shape of a yin and yang, I had to have it.” (Fincher 1999)

يتحدث جاك عن تحول الرجال من ممارسة العادة السرية بالنظر الى المجلات الخليعة (عمل رجولي) الى ممارسة الاستهلاكية بالنظر الى كتالوج ايكيا (الرجولة الحالية)
"We used to read pornography. Now it was the Horchow Collection. "

ثم يتسائل، أي نوع من اثاث غرفة الطعام سيحدد شخصيتي؟
"What kind of dining set defines me as a person?"

كما نرى في بداية الفلم شقة جاك المرتبة والتي كأنها كتالوج أثاث ايكيا، قبل ان ينتقل للسكن في بيت تايلر المهجور (والتي تعد خرابة) والذي يمثل هذه النوستالجيا الصورية لمعنى الرجولة في العيش كانسان الكهف.. (بالاضافة الى القتال والتواصل مع الرجال الاخرين عن طريق العنف)

***

تبعا لوصف فالودي عن المجتمع الامريكي، فقد أصبح الرجل اليوم متهما، فالنسويات يتهمنه بأنه هو المجرم الظالم الذي مارس تسلطه عليهن في العصور الماضية، ولم يعد يعرف الرجل ما الذي يحشره في الركن ومن هو العدو الذي يصارع ضده؟

"Faludi writes: "Men have no clearly defined enemy who is oppressing them. How can men be oppressed when the culture has already identified them as the oppressors, and when they see themselves that way?" (Lynn Ta, 2006)

***


تبعا لقول
Lynn M. Ta
فإن فالودي ترى الحل في اعادة الرجولة الى ما كان عليه الرجال قبل الحرب العالمية، وبالتالي، فإنها تحصر الرجولة في صورة معينة ومطلقة

"The flaw in Faludi’s argument is that she seems to privilege a prewar rugged masculinity that men should return to, and in doing so, implies that an essential masculine identity exists. "(Lynn Ta, 2006)

وتعزو "لين تا" الى اطروحة
Judith Butler - "Melancholy Gender/Refused Identification."
في صياغة الجندر في الأدوار بدلا من الصياغة الشكلية
gender as performance

"If anything, the tensions in Fight Club reveal the instability of gender identity and underscores Butler’s idea of gender as performance. " (Lynn Ta, 2006)

ولكن عمل فالودي مهم لفهم المحيط الذي حدثت فيه التغييرات على معاني الرجولة لدى الرجل الأمريكي الحالي

Nevertheless, Faludi’s work is important in registering the contextual and perceptual shifts that have impacted the conceptualization of white masculinity."(Lynn Ta, 2006)



*يتبع*

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

For those who think all feminism is just an excuse for "man-hating", this book should be required reading. It is written by a prominent feminist author and focuses on the male experience in America without the demonizing that some men seem to believe is at the core of feminism. In fact the book could be accused of taking too charitable a view of men - what society expects from them, and how other changes in society have made those expectations difficult to achieve - in light of the domestic abuse, assault, or murder which has brought them to the author's attention in the first place. The male subjects of the novel are given room to express themselves and the author generally avoids making negative comments, with rare but understandable exceptions. If the author is to be believed, she set out to write a book about male resistance to feminist advances only to find her subject morphing from a view of antagonistic males to a view of men in a crisis born out of changes in America's economic landscape which remain largely misunderstood as causes for burgeoning dissatisfaction among American men.

Content-wise: a great deal of the book is, unsurprisingly, given over to what men had to say about their fathers. In the context of the economic heritage of American men and the gender roles they learned from their fathers (or perhaps more correctly, learned from the absence thereof) this is rather central to the book, though the jacket and other short descriptions don't make much mention of it. It's possible those writing about the book expect the careful reader will have guessed at the presence of the subject matter already. Much of the information is given by the men the author interviewed. Some fact-checking is evidenced by statements to the effect "a call to confirm the story was made which verified the claim being made", and other facts are given by the author interstitially. Showing some figures and reasoning based on employment, wage, or other statistics would have been very helpful to the case the author is trying to make, however, and the absence thereof makes the book feel a lot more like navel-gazing than true investigation.

Most readers will find something to like here. Those who take interest in son-father relationships, changes in civic society engagement, men's responses to feminism prior to 1999, and the effects of a macro transition from skilled manufacturing to service industry employment will be especially satisfied. Those looking for pure economics will be disappointed.

[T. Hodges · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book in my early twenties and it was a valuable addition to my perspective on the world. At the time, I had been reading a great deal about masculinity, mostly finding works by male authors that were hysterically irrelevant. It was at first counter-intuitive, I picked up a book by a female and a feminist, not knowing what I'd find, but at the time, open to trying anything. This book was where the insights I was looking for had been hidden.

Sometimes, I think that no male writer may have ever been able to illuminate what Faludi managed in this book. Why? Those other authors were the very thing that they were trying to understand. Climb a mountain to get a better perspective on the landscape -- But what if you are the landscape? Admittedly the book is dense and was a huge time commitment for me -- an incredibility slow reader -- to finish. Also, its been ten years, so I can't speak to whether or not the material is dated. Still, I wish every male would pick this book up at about the age of twenty-two, and really meditate on what the author is trying to show you.

Even today, I still remember a line, not a perfect quote I'm sure, in the authors concluding thoughts. Essentially, it called on us to remember that before any ways we might define ourselves, we are human before all else. We are human before we are a man or a woman, a theist or an atheist, a democrat or a republican, an American or a Canadian.

[Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

I guess some people felt Faludi let men off the hook with this one (though not Bill O'Reilly, who came tantalizingly close to having a coronary event while "interviewing" the author), but to me, this represents an important attempt to understand the sociological underpinnings of some of the f-d up ways in which my gender behaves. Then again, I would say that, wouldn't I? Moohahaha!

Anyway, Faludi writes well, scored some great interviews, and offers important insights that still seem relevant almost 10 years later. The section on male body image was especially right on--it made me think of a guy I know who pops roids like candy, driven on by economic and emotional insecurity and bullshit Hollywood action-film fuckery. If only Faludi had addressed leg-extension surgeries--you can get them done very cheaply in Russia, fyi.

http://www.time.com/time/world/articl...

[Jessica · Rating 1 out of 5]

Perhaps one star is a bit harsh on this book, but the author was unfairly biased and couldn't put aside her dark glasses to see things from a different perspective. I read this book for a senior level journalism class in college, and I remember a heated debate where I refuted her misplaced claims by quoting Scripture. I think I was the only student who actually knew any of the Bible, so it was received with a lot of dumbfounded looks. In the same breath as "women, submit to your husbands" the Bible also says "men, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her." How any author can ignore this and think her point is valid is heading for a rude awakening. If there were any good points to the book, they were overshadowed by her ignorance. To be fair, it has been awhile since I read it.

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

A long, dense book, though the writing flowed with plenty of live scenes, e.g., in restaurants, with storytelling and dialog.

As an aside... I came of age during the women's movement of the '60s but *never* blamed men. Instead, I saw our toxic culture oppressing both women and men. I always hoped for a men's movement where men could bond in a safe place and become their authentic selves. A men's movement was started some time ago (a few of my friends were involved), though the groups have drawn only a small percentage so far. Perhaps this book will help spread the word.

I especially liked the chapters on Vietnam, the Promise Keepers, and, surprisingly, Sylvester Stallone. My own family fit right in, with my silent veteran dad and my unfathered brother. So the stories were eerily familiar.

A long slog, but worth it. Recommended.

[Paige · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had started this book a long time ago and kind of stalled part way through because seriously, Susan? 100 pages of Cleveland Browns stuff was not the strongest point of this book. I really don't need to know what kind of mask & costume every single "Dawg Pounder" wore, and I could've actually done with more Promise Keepers or Cal Jammer stuff. Anyway, I am really glad I decided to finish it, because after the Browns stuff it got really good.

[Laura Schmidt-Dockter · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have had this book on my "to read" shelf, literally, for at least 5 years. For me, now was the perfect time to finally crack the binding. The anger in America is not coming from any particular, single arena. This book gives a glimpse of at least one portion of the population; "the American man". One can never have too much empathy. That is what I have gained from this book.

[Shiloh]

I really want to read this book but why is it so long? Why does it assume right off that the middle class male is the "everyman" that has disappeared from our consciousness, without justifying the argument? How long will it take me to spell consciousness correctly? 3 minutes.

[Andrea Thorpe · Rating 1 out of 5]

Got to page 30 and threw in the towel...Faludi said the same things in so many different ways that I really couldn't see the sense in 600 pages to drive home the point...really too bad, because some of the material was really interesting.

[Peter Langston · Rating 1 out of 5]

Supposedly the other side of the feminist/chauvanist divide, written by one of the leading feminist writers. I found it confusing and overly detailed in case studies.

[Mikayla Findlay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought the format of this book was questionable - it could have been at least two books and the final synthesis was especially lacking considering all the build up - but I did enjoy it as a whole and there are lots of gold nuggets embedded in the lengthy narrative.

I am sharing my favorite nugget as a highlight: “Men who were determined to keep the fantasy going had to range far to find a viable pretext, which may be one explanation for the remarkably consistent correlation between militia membership and antiabortion zealotry. Both "movements" are about protection -and the silent fetus, unlike the unpredictable modern woman, is one captive who can't reject a protection offer. No wonder that fetuses in antiabortion literature are most often depicted as little girls. That convention was in evidence at the Waco memorial service, where a huge blowup photograph towered over the proceedings, the largest emblem on display: a picture of a fetus, with a caption entreating us to save "her" life. But even rescuing the captive fetus has its problems. The fetus's captor, after all, is a woman. Even here, then, the men found themselves back in battle with their true nemesis: the independent woman.”

[Guilherme Smee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quase não acredito que finalmente terminei de ler este livro que tem por volta de setecentas páginas. O problema dele não é nem o tema e nem a extensão de páginas, mas a forma como a autora de Domados, Susan Faludi, escolheu para contar as histórias feitas através de sua pesquisa: o New Journalism. Eu entendo que o New Journalism seja uma forma de contar as reportagens e entrevistas feitas por um jornalista-escritor de forma romanceada, se atendo mais à narrativa do que aos fatos em si. Para quem busca dados para uma pesquisa e teorias para apoiar essa pesquisa o livro parece enfadonho, circulando nas mesmas histórias. Certamente o livraço de setecentas páginas poderia tranquilamente ter a metade disso e não perder em conteúdo e em inferências. Prova disso é que a introdução do livro é empolgante e nada enfadonhs, porque faz um apanhado geral da masculinidade que se pretende entender através de uma contextualização. O problema é tudo que vem depois da introdução. Nem todo mundo está disposto a ler um livro de setecentas páginas para se chegar às mesmas conclusões das primeiras páginas do mesmo...

[John Stepper · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wonderful new preface, and seemingly tireless and exhausting ethnography. There is an excellent chapter, for example, on the aftermath of layoffs at a shipyard and McDonell-Douglas.

What marred the book for me was the level of detail about, say, the Cleveland Browns or Sly Stallone, as it seemed tangential at best. And the tone in describing many of these men seemed downright contemptuous, ridiculing men who invited her into their homes and private lives, and were clearly suffering.

[Jan Priddy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I actually found an interview with Faludi more interesting than this book—which I admit I began skimming.

Her claim in the interview was that men were being shoved out of the penthouse to one of the upper floors and women were coming out of the basement to the ground floor. Ignore balance and what might be fair and equitable—upward movement is far more hopeful than downward. That made a great deal of sense to me.

On the other hand . . .

[Andrew Fischer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finally done! This last one was definitely more helpful than the middle few, but still very much a sociology book. Unfortunately I was very ready to be done with this but that’s not a knock against the quality of the book itself

[Oliver Bateman · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book's a whopper, tons of reported material, 600 ponderous but potent pages. it's far less popular than backlash (which is referenced in a paul barman rap, wudjabelieveit? "gonna backlash that booty like susan faludi" is the line), but her points about consumerist, ornamental masculinity and the soul-destroying nature of late capitalism are well made. of course, simply privileging men by constructing this huge narrative for them was problematic at the time (and surely today as well), as was her concluding claim that only by finding a "new way for men" can all other civil rights movements truly succeed (which have thus far followed masculine "war-style" models to achieve objectives). the lament of the absent, inexplicable postwar father is a leitmotif of the book, and one which impelled me to launch a blog of my dead father's e-mails, hoping for some explanation of what it had all meant: http://crazydademails.tumblr.com/

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well written and researched, 'Stiffed' helps to explain why and how "conventional" (i.e. pre-WWII) masculinity has all but come to be extinct. The factors are many: new technologies, the rise in feminism, hyper-consumerism, world economies, mechanization, the high number of women in the workforce, changing gender roles. For Faludi, the American man has been abandoned by many of the organizations and groups that, prior to WWII, greatly helped to bestow and shape the definition and title of "manly," "masculine" and "manhood". The result is a post-WWII generation of men and boys uncertain of where and how they are to fit into a world that is so different from the one passed down from their fathers.