What do you think?
Rate this book
La mujer completa
La mujer completa es el libro que Germaine Greer había jurado que nunca escribiría. Pero, treinta años después de la publicación de su histórico La mujer eunuco, la conocida feminista australiana estima que ha llegado el momento de recuperar la indignación.
A pesar de un sentimiento de satisfacción generalizado, que hace creer que la "cuestión de la mujer" ya está resuelta, lo cierto es que se están perdiendo de vista los objetivos de lo que en sus inicios fue un movimiento de liberación. Así, se ha logrado embaucar a las mujeres para que se conformen con una falsa igualdad.
Los treinta y cinco capítulos que componen La mujer completa están ligados entre sí por una apasionada retórica, un análisis agudo y penetrante y un desbordante sentido del humor. Germaine Greer repasa tópicos como el sexo, la mutilación, la pena, los pechos o el poder de las chicas. Con argumentos sólidos, la autora demuestra que, si bien las mujeres han recorrido un largo camino en los últimos treinta años, la idea de que ya se ha alcanzado la meta sirve para encubrir la discriminación y explotación que continúan afectando a las mujeres de todo el mundo, en ámbitos tan fundamentales como la salud, la sexualidad, el trabajo, la política, la publicidad o la economía.
La mujer completa posee la misma dosis de polémica que hizo vender más de un millón de ejemplares de La mujer eunuco, y que ha mantenido a Germaine Greer desde entonces en el centro de la controversia. Se trata, en suma, de un texto apasionante y de lectura obligada para las personas inteligentes del mundo.
Germaine Greer es autora, ente otras obras, de La mujer eunuco; Sexo y destino; El acmbio; The Obstacle Race; The Madwoman's Underclothes; Daddy o Slip-shod Sibyls. En la actualidad es catedrática de inglés y estudios literarios comparados en la Universidad de Warwick (Reino Unido).
A pesar de un sentimiento de satisfacción generalizado, que hace creer que la "cuestión de la mujer" ya está resuelta, lo cierto es que se están perdiendo de vista los objetivos de lo que en sus inicios fue un movimiento de liberación. Así, se ha logrado embaucar a las mujeres para que se conformen con una falsa igualdad.
Los treinta y cinco capítulos que componen La mujer completa están ligados entre sí por una apasionada retórica, un análisis agudo y penetrante y un desbordante sentido del humor. Germaine Greer repasa tópicos como el sexo, la mutilación, la pena, los pechos o el poder de las chicas. Con argumentos sólidos, la autora demuestra que, si bien las mujeres han recorrido un largo camino en los últimos treinta años, la idea de que ya se ha alcanzado la meta sirve para encubrir la discriminación y explotación que continúan afectando a las mujeres de todo el mundo, en ámbitos tan fundamentales como la salud, la sexualidad, el trabajo, la política, la publicidad o la economía.
La mujer completa posee la misma dosis de polémica que hizo vender más de un millón de ejemplares de La mujer eunuco, y que ha mantenido a Germaine Greer desde entonces en el centro de la controversia. Se trata, en suma, de un texto apasionante y de lectura obligada para las personas inteligentes del mundo.
Germaine Greer es autora, ente otras obras, de La mujer eunuco; Sexo y destino; El acmbio; The Obstacle Race; The Madwoman's Underclothes; Daddy o Slip-shod Sibyls. En la actualidad es catedrática de inglés y estudios literarios comparados en la Universidad de Warwick (Reino Unido).
540 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
95 people are currently reading
2856 people want to read
About the author
Germaine Greer
84 books672 followersGermaine Greer is an Australian born writer, journalist and scholar of early modern English literature, widely regarded as one of the most significant feminist voices of the later 20th century.
Greer's ideas have created controversy ever since her ground-breaking The Female Eunuch became an international best-seller in 1970, turning her overnight into a household name and bringing her both adulation and criticism. She is also the author of Sex and Destiny: The Politics of Human Fertility (1984), The Change: Women, Ageing and the Menopause (1991), and most recently Shakespeare's Wife (2007).
Greer's ideas have created controversy ever since her ground-breaking The Female Eunuch became an international best-seller in 1970, turning her overnight into a household name and bringing her both adulation and criticism. She is also the author of Sex and Destiny: The Politics of Human Fertility (1984), The Change: Women, Ageing and the Menopause (1991), and most recently Shakespeare's Wife (2007).
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 77 reviews
September 24, 2014
First of all, I’m afraid I have to disagree with most reviewers saying that they have problems with the book and/or Germaine Greer herself because of her angry tone. I don’t think that an attitude such as Greer’s is necessarily unhelpful, disempowering, or anything else that people have named, and I don’t think that her anger is making her points and/or arguments invalid or at least worth less.
However, my problem with Whole Woman is the fact that most of Greer’s arguments are invalid, regardless of her tone. She often talks in circles, interprets statistics and/or research wrongly, and hops from topic to topic as if it’s nothing. I often had moments while reading that I was waiting for her to make a point, and then either the point never came (and instead a new topic was breached), or the point had nothing to do with the arguments she had been discussing in the past pages.
The fact that Greer’s feminism isn’t inclusive is also quite a negative point for me, and the way she treats and/or talks about people who fall into the LBTQIA+ community is revolting in certain parts. A rant of hers on people with Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (AIS) is especially bad. I understand Greer’s enormous influence on feminism in general, but it shocks me that she still supports these (dated) views.
Another thing which I found confusing is that even though Greer talks about women being able to do what they want (and wanting to liberate women), she still seems to have this idea in mind about what a woman must be. She’s constantly talking about mothers, wombs, having children, and so on as all being this HUGE part of being a woman – of course, she’s allowed to form her opinions on the matter, but I can’t seem to unite the two beliefs that women should be able to do what they want yet they still have to conform to a certain idea of what a woman is (Greer’s idea, in this case, with which I often don't agree). Feminism for me is about giving everybody the same choices, and not dictating those choices or mocking them.
And last but not least, Greer’s chapter on daughters absolutely disgusted me, especially in the way she uses dated Freudian analogies to describe the relationships between fathers and daughters. The way she approaches father-daughter interaction as seduction, and asks herself how men/fathers are supposed to ignore their daughters’ sexuality when they’re being confronted with their flirtations and revealing clothing (mind you, we’re talking about small children here) – I just can’t grasp it. Not to mention the fact that it’s generalization at its best (because nobody ever begged (a.k.a. ‘flirted’ with) their mother to get something for them, did they?).
In short, I agree with a number of things Greer discusses in Whole Woman, but I also disagree with her on a big number of the matters she presents in it. My biggest problem with this book is that it isn’t well-written because of Greer’s tendency to talk in circles, give displaced arguments as ‘support’ for her conclusions, and the fact that she sometimes seems to pull theories or ‘facts’ out of thin air.
Would I recommend this? Yes and no. If you’re interested in feminism and in Greer’s views/influence on the movement, it’s probably a book for you. Otherwise, nope. Unless you want an example of excellent generalizations, talking in circles, displaced arguments, and dated views.
However, my problem with Whole Woman is the fact that most of Greer’s arguments are invalid, regardless of her tone. She often talks in circles, interprets statistics and/or research wrongly, and hops from topic to topic as if it’s nothing. I often had moments while reading that I was waiting for her to make a point, and then either the point never came (and instead a new topic was breached), or the point had nothing to do with the arguments she had been discussing in the past pages.
The fact that Greer’s feminism isn’t inclusive is also quite a negative point for me, and the way she treats and/or talks about people who fall into the LBTQIA+ community is revolting in certain parts. A rant of hers on people with Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (AIS) is especially bad. I understand Greer’s enormous influence on feminism in general, but it shocks me that she still supports these (dated) views.
Another thing which I found confusing is that even though Greer talks about women being able to do what they want (and wanting to liberate women), she still seems to have this idea in mind about what a woman must be. She’s constantly talking about mothers, wombs, having children, and so on as all being this HUGE part of being a woman – of course, she’s allowed to form her opinions on the matter, but I can’t seem to unite the two beliefs that women should be able to do what they want yet they still have to conform to a certain idea of what a woman is (Greer’s idea, in this case, with which I often don't agree). Feminism for me is about giving everybody the same choices, and not dictating those choices or mocking them.
And last but not least, Greer’s chapter on daughters absolutely disgusted me, especially in the way she uses dated Freudian analogies to describe the relationships between fathers and daughters. The way she approaches father-daughter interaction as seduction, and asks herself how men/fathers are supposed to ignore their daughters’ sexuality when they’re being confronted with their flirtations and revealing clothing (mind you, we’re talking about small children here) – I just can’t grasp it. Not to mention the fact that it’s generalization at its best (because nobody ever begged (a.k.a. ‘flirted’ with) their mother to get something for them, did they?).
In short, I agree with a number of things Greer discusses in Whole Woman, but I also disagree with her on a big number of the matters she presents in it. My biggest problem with this book is that it isn’t well-written because of Greer’s tendency to talk in circles, give displaced arguments as ‘support’ for her conclusions, and the fact that she sometimes seems to pull theories or ‘facts’ out of thin air.
Would I recommend this? Yes and no. If you’re interested in feminism and in Greer’s views/influence on the movement, it’s probably a book for you. Otherwise, nope. Unless you want an example of excellent generalizations, talking in circles, displaced arguments, and dated views.
June 18, 2012
After reading this book, I strongly believe that every woman should also attempt to read Greer’s second feminist tome. The book is thought-provoking, shocking, and caused me a lot of personal anger at the insensitivity and inequality that women are still subjected to. Much like a religious doctrine there are a multitude of Greer’s arguments that appear not be practical, or in the best interests of women; however, I would class most of her arguments as extremely relative to the female cause and I admire Greer immensely for her commitment to this novel and to women everywhere.
The book is divided into short chapters which are untitled by a single theme, such as body, that demonstrate that women have neither achieved the equality or the liberation that feminism seeks. The book also deconstructs the myth of men’s’ power over women, and over their own lives. In every page it is urged that women be valued as mothers, wise-women, and as sisters, over age-defying and fashion obsessed bimbos that mirror the articles found in Cosmopolitan. In a perfect world women would be valued for their contributions as people, and not judged on how pretty, young, and how well they conform to the precent predominantly set by men. I strongly urge women everywhere to pick up this book and read it – it provides you with the most valuable weapon against sexism....knowledge.
The book is divided into short chapters which are untitled by a single theme, such as body, that demonstrate that women have neither achieved the equality or the liberation that feminism seeks. The book also deconstructs the myth of men’s’ power over women, and over their own lives. In every page it is urged that women be valued as mothers, wise-women, and as sisters, over age-defying and fashion obsessed bimbos that mirror the articles found in Cosmopolitan. In a perfect world women would be valued for their contributions as people, and not judged on how pretty, young, and how well they conform to the precent predominantly set by men. I strongly urge women everywhere to pick up this book and read it – it provides you with the most valuable weapon against sexism....knowledge.
March 20, 2024
I really enjoyed carrying this one around in my "external womb" (ie my purse).
The Whole Woman is the “sequel” to the The Female Eunoch, written over thirty years ago. In it, Germaine Greer comments on the state of today’s feminism and rallies third wave feminists to the cause of Women’s Liberation. Greer believes there is a major distinction to be made between liberation and equality. To accept equality as the endpoint is to take “the male status quo as the condition to which women aspire.” Her belief is that “If women can see no future beyond joining the masculinist elite on its own terms, our civilization will become more destructive than ever…..Liberation struggles are not about assimilation but about assertion of difference, endowing that difference with dignity and prestige, and insisting on it as a condition of self definition and self determination.”
To prove this point, Greer goes through a laundry list of issues with a distinctive point of view. Much of it is no surprise. Women are economically disadvantaged by “the beauty myth.” Women still do the majority of housework and childrearing, despite the fact that they work outside of the home as well. Women earn less money than men and professions that have high numbers of women are devalued (such as teaching). Women are victims of violence and are not treated well by the male health establishment. Childcare is this country is expensive and inaccessible to many.
What I really enjoyed about this book is Greer’s way of taking an issue and looking at it outside of the box. I didn’t agree with all of her conclusions. For example, Greer has a chapter on “transexuality” which was offensive. She comes out saying “cruel and unsympathetic though it may seem, women should not automatically accept all those who do not wish to be male as being ex gratia females.” Ultimately, she is arguing that the medical establishment should not view the absence of maleness as femaleness. Sex change surgeries don’t give people wombs and without wombs they aren’t female. I don’t agree. In another example, her chapter on mutilation argues against many of the UN sanctions against female genital mutilation. Most feminists would agree that this custom is unacceptable, but then Greer goes to suggest that the current Western medical establishment is mutilating women through episiotomies and the medicalization of childbirth. Right on on the episiotomy front… I don’t agree on the fgm part.
Her chapter on abortion is really interesting. She views abortion as another form of medical oppression. “What women “won” was the right to undergo invasive procedures in order to terminate unwanted pregnancies, unwanted not just by them but by their parents, their sexual partners, the governments who would not support mothers, the employers who would not employ mothers, the landlords who would not accept tenants with children, the schools that would not accept students with children. Historically, the only thing pro-abortion agitation achieved was to make an illiberal establishment look far more feminist than it was.” She ultimately states that there is no way that women can have the freedom to manage their own lives if access to abortion is denied. But, “feminism is pro woman rather than pro abortion we have always argued for freedom of reproductive choice. A choice is only possible if there are genuine alternatives.”
I do wish that Greer could have presented the positives along with the negatives. There are movements in this country fighting against episiotomies and many women now give birth at home to avoid the medical establishment. Women are working on so many fronts and while we have a long way to go, I think acknowledging the areas where things are going right is just as important as looking for the ways in which the feminist movement may have veered in the wrong direction.
Despite that, I really enjoyed this book. It made me think and reexamine some of my beliefs.
Some other quotes that I particularly enjoyed…
“Millions of women sit knitting garments that nobody wants because the hours of fiddling work give them an opportunity gradually to release the intolerable pressure of their unspoken love.” This one made me giggle... I'm a knitter.
“The notion that all women were “sisters,” bound together across ethnic, class, generational, and regional lines by their common experiences as an oppressed group, was the most powerful, Utopian, and therefore, threatening concept feminists advanced in the 1970s.”
“Women are driven through the health system like sheep through a dip. The disease they are being treated for is womanhood.”
“All this suffering, all this mess, is the direct consequence of the insistence upon the accessibility of the cervix to the ejaculating penis.”
“Why do women always carry bags, and why are these bags so often heavy? Why is it that most women will not go out of the house without bags loaded with objects of no immediate use? Is the tote bag an exterior uterus, the outward sign of the unmentionable burden?”
I "heart" my external womb!
The Whole Woman is the “sequel” to the The Female Eunoch, written over thirty years ago. In it, Germaine Greer comments on the state of today’s feminism and rallies third wave feminists to the cause of Women’s Liberation. Greer believes there is a major distinction to be made between liberation and equality. To accept equality as the endpoint is to take “the male status quo as the condition to which women aspire.” Her belief is that “If women can see no future beyond joining the masculinist elite on its own terms, our civilization will become more destructive than ever…..Liberation struggles are not about assimilation but about assertion of difference, endowing that difference with dignity and prestige, and insisting on it as a condition of self definition and self determination.”
To prove this point, Greer goes through a laundry list of issues with a distinctive point of view. Much of it is no surprise. Women are economically disadvantaged by “the beauty myth.” Women still do the majority of housework and childrearing, despite the fact that they work outside of the home as well. Women earn less money than men and professions that have high numbers of women are devalued (such as teaching). Women are victims of violence and are not treated well by the male health establishment. Childcare is this country is expensive and inaccessible to many.
What I really enjoyed about this book is Greer’s way of taking an issue and looking at it outside of the box. I didn’t agree with all of her conclusions. For example, Greer has a chapter on “transexuality” which was offensive. She comes out saying “cruel and unsympathetic though it may seem, women should not automatically accept all those who do not wish to be male as being ex gratia females.” Ultimately, she is arguing that the medical establishment should not view the absence of maleness as femaleness. Sex change surgeries don’t give people wombs and without wombs they aren’t female. I don’t agree. In another example, her chapter on mutilation argues against many of the UN sanctions against female genital mutilation. Most feminists would agree that this custom is unacceptable, but then Greer goes to suggest that the current Western medical establishment is mutilating women through episiotomies and the medicalization of childbirth. Right on on the episiotomy front… I don’t agree on the fgm part.
Her chapter on abortion is really interesting. She views abortion as another form of medical oppression. “What women “won” was the right to undergo invasive procedures in order to terminate unwanted pregnancies, unwanted not just by them but by their parents, their sexual partners, the governments who would not support mothers, the employers who would not employ mothers, the landlords who would not accept tenants with children, the schools that would not accept students with children. Historically, the only thing pro-abortion agitation achieved was to make an illiberal establishment look far more feminist than it was.” She ultimately states that there is no way that women can have the freedom to manage their own lives if access to abortion is denied. But, “feminism is pro woman rather than pro abortion we have always argued for freedom of reproductive choice. A choice is only possible if there are genuine alternatives.”
I do wish that Greer could have presented the positives along with the negatives. There are movements in this country fighting against episiotomies and many women now give birth at home to avoid the medical establishment. Women are working on so many fronts and while we have a long way to go, I think acknowledging the areas where things are going right is just as important as looking for the ways in which the feminist movement may have veered in the wrong direction.
Despite that, I really enjoyed this book. It made me think and reexamine some of my beliefs.
Some other quotes that I particularly enjoyed…
“Millions of women sit knitting garments that nobody wants because the hours of fiddling work give them an opportunity gradually to release the intolerable pressure of their unspoken love.” This one made me giggle... I'm a knitter.
“The notion that all women were “sisters,” bound together across ethnic, class, generational, and regional lines by their common experiences as an oppressed group, was the most powerful, Utopian, and therefore, threatening concept feminists advanced in the 1970s.”
“Women are driven through the health system like sheep through a dip. The disease they are being treated for is womanhood.”
“All this suffering, all this mess, is the direct consequence of the insistence upon the accessibility of the cervix to the ejaculating penis.”
“Why do women always carry bags, and why are these bags so often heavy? Why is it that most women will not go out of the house without bags loaded with objects of no immediate use? Is the tote bag an exterior uterus, the outward sign of the unmentionable burden?”
I "heart" my external womb!
July 16, 2018
I don't always agree with Germain Greer but I do admire her feistiness and willingness to state uncomfortable opinions. Her arguments are always well thought out, making me question my own opinions which is something I really appreciate and, I think, is important.
I wanted to read this book after the recent controversies in the press in relation to transwomen in order to understand where she was coming from as the media often twist things according to their own narrative. It is interesting to consider what makes me a woman: my vagina, my womb, my upbringing or is there an essential, undefinable, thing that makes me a woman? I don't have the answer to this. Her argument does seem a little outdated, and more of an intellectual point in her book rather than focusing on the emotional aspects/ struggles for the trans community. Perhaps, it is not my job to understand or to intellectualise this question, after all, I am not trans and will never know what that feels like, and I am not a medical expert. My opinion hasn't changed; just treat all people with respect, avoid hurting someone, and wouldn't it be nice if we could move away from being defined by our genders.
Reading this book made me think about how far feminism has come, how far it has to go and also where the movement has failed. It also made me question my 'type' of feminism. 'Women's liberation did not see the female's potential in terms of the male's actual; the visionary feminists of the late sixties and early seventies knew that women could never find freedom by agreeing to live the lives of unfree men. Seekers after equality clamoured to be admitted to smoke-filled male haunts'.
The chapter titled Sorrow was particularly interesting for me: 'Feeling sadness oneself is thought, by women as well as men, to be a symptom of an illness and in need of treatment. In fact, sadness is uncomfortable and creative which is why consumer society cannot tolerate it. Consumer culture sells antidotes to sadness'. As someone who has suffered from depression and been prescribed medication for it, I did find it a tad worrying how accessible pills are compared to alternative treatments, and that we don't look at ways to improve our societal structures in order for it to adapt to the mental needs of a person (male or female).
This book was like having a great drunken discussion with an older aunt (only more articulate). I felt challenged, optimistic, angry and sad while reading this.
I wanted to read this book after the recent controversies in the press in relation to transwomen in order to understand where she was coming from as the media often twist things according to their own narrative. It is interesting to consider what makes me a woman: my vagina, my womb, my upbringing or is there an essential, undefinable, thing that makes me a woman? I don't have the answer to this. Her argument does seem a little outdated, and more of an intellectual point in her book rather than focusing on the emotional aspects/ struggles for the trans community. Perhaps, it is not my job to understand or to intellectualise this question, after all, I am not trans and will never know what that feels like, and I am not a medical expert. My opinion hasn't changed; just treat all people with respect, avoid hurting someone, and wouldn't it be nice if we could move away from being defined by our genders.
Reading this book made me think about how far feminism has come, how far it has to go and also where the movement has failed. It also made me question my 'type' of feminism. 'Women's liberation did not see the female's potential in terms of the male's actual; the visionary feminists of the late sixties and early seventies knew that women could never find freedom by agreeing to live the lives of unfree men. Seekers after equality clamoured to be admitted to smoke-filled male haunts'.
The chapter titled Sorrow was particularly interesting for me: 'Feeling sadness oneself is thought, by women as well as men, to be a symptom of an illness and in need of treatment. In fact, sadness is uncomfortable and creative which is why consumer society cannot tolerate it. Consumer culture sells antidotes to sadness'. As someone who has suffered from depression and been prescribed medication for it, I did find it a tad worrying how accessible pills are compared to alternative treatments, and that we don't look at ways to improve our societal structures in order for it to adapt to the mental needs of a person (male or female).
This book was like having a great drunken discussion with an older aunt (only more articulate). I felt challenged, optimistic, angry and sad while reading this.
July 24, 2016
This book was important to me when I was a teenager and didn't know anything, and she's fairly spot on about male violence. On the other hand, her dedication to spewing vitriol at some of the worlds most marginalised women - transgender women and sex workers - is horrific.
"A drug addicted prostitute is the least free person in the world" yikes, Germaine! If all transactional sex is rape as she claims then it makes no difference if a client is respectful of their boundaries and pays the agreed upon fee or if he forcibly rapes her. Following on from that, if the presence of money (or whatever is being traded) means the sex is coercive rape, then sex workers are unrapeable, since their consent doesn't matter. That's a pretty messed up position to take isn't it? Attitudes like this are inextricably tied with the legal systems refusal to charge men who rape and brutalise sex workers with these crimes, with police charging men who rape sex workers with theft of services, with police who don't even bother to investigate crimes including murder of sex workers and instead marking them as NHI - 'no human involved'. I doubt she has any actual concern for the welfare of workers in the sex industries but if she did, she'd be going about it all the wrong way.
Things get even worse when she talks about trans women. She claims that trans women are all fetishists who 'get off on the idea of being feminine and sexy' yet there's no mention of the fact that cisgender women do this also; have you ever seen a lingerie ad? The whole angle is about feeling sexy. She claims that trans women don't want the 'reality of being female, like menstruation and pregnancy' (Greer herself never had children, is she a fake woman too?) which is flagrantly untrue; like all women, some trans women want kids and others don't, and countless women who are infertile, cis and trans alike, are excited about developments like the possibility of uterus implants and transplants on the horizon. She posits being transgender as some kind of neurosis (which, if she believes being trans is a mental illness, makes all the horrible shit she says about trans women ableist) despite the fact that dysphoria is no longer considered required to be trans according to the DSM anyway and autogynephilia has similar roots to homosexuality; both are socially constructed mental illnesses designed to oppress LGBT people. Unfortunately she doesn't stop there (the chapter 'pantomime dames' is solely focused on repeating the worst oppressive beliefs about trans women), she goes on to talk about various cultures around the world and how people we would call trans women in the west engage in barbaric self mutilation - she doesn't even tried to hide the overt racist overtones in describing people of colour in exploited nations this way, she evokes every racist trope you can imagine, painting them as 'backwards' 'savages' etc. If you know your feminist history, you'll know that this all started with Sheila Jeffrey's book 'the transsexual empire', and the impact it had on Greer is obvious if you've read 'The Female Eunuch'. Greer, like Jeffreys, seems to think there's some kind of transgender conspiracy to degrade Real Wombyn and force them into enslavement a la Immortan Joe in Mad Max, it's perplexing. Also bizarre is the fact that she claims to care about Aboriginal Australians to the point where she's left the country and won't come back until and unless she's given permission (even though there's no central governing body who could do so). Does her care and concern extend to Sistergirls (Aboriginal Australian trans women)? Somehow I doubt it, and I'm sure she'd gleefully use all the a or racist tropes against them as well.
Her meditations on things like plastic surgery, the relationships women have to other people (daughter, wife, mother) are pretty uninspired, I can't recall anything noteworthy about them. She does talk about rape in a social psychological context and how we (as a society) think of penises as being violent and scary when in truth, rape is often perpetrated with foreign objects so a penis isn't even required. Oddly enough, her discussion of this subject would, to anyone who isn't a raging bigot, provide yet more reasons as to why trans women aren't a threat or a danger to trans women but, like her discussions of how flimsy biological sex is in 'the female eunuch', her dedication to her hatred of trans women trumps her own research and ideas.
Really, the only thing that's worth reading is the chapter about male violence, but you can't quote it or share it cos then you have to admit to reading Greer and who's going to put their hand up to that?
To summarise, Greer should've taken her own advice and stopped after 'the female eunuch'.
"A drug addicted prostitute is the least free person in the world" yikes, Germaine! If all transactional sex is rape as she claims then it makes no difference if a client is respectful of their boundaries and pays the agreed upon fee or if he forcibly rapes her. Following on from that, if the presence of money (or whatever is being traded) means the sex is coercive rape, then sex workers are unrapeable, since their consent doesn't matter. That's a pretty messed up position to take isn't it? Attitudes like this are inextricably tied with the legal systems refusal to charge men who rape and brutalise sex workers with these crimes, with police charging men who rape sex workers with theft of services, with police who don't even bother to investigate crimes including murder of sex workers and instead marking them as NHI - 'no human involved'. I doubt she has any actual concern for the welfare of workers in the sex industries but if she did, she'd be going about it all the wrong way.
Things get even worse when she talks about trans women. She claims that trans women are all fetishists who 'get off on the idea of being feminine and sexy' yet there's no mention of the fact that cisgender women do this also; have you ever seen a lingerie ad? The whole angle is about feeling sexy. She claims that trans women don't want the 'reality of being female, like menstruation and pregnancy' (Greer herself never had children, is she a fake woman too?) which is flagrantly untrue; like all women, some trans women want kids and others don't, and countless women who are infertile, cis and trans alike, are excited about developments like the possibility of uterus implants and transplants on the horizon. She posits being transgender as some kind of neurosis (which, if she believes being trans is a mental illness, makes all the horrible shit she says about trans women ableist) despite the fact that dysphoria is no longer considered required to be trans according to the DSM anyway and autogynephilia has similar roots to homosexuality; both are socially constructed mental illnesses designed to oppress LGBT people. Unfortunately she doesn't stop there (the chapter 'pantomime dames' is solely focused on repeating the worst oppressive beliefs about trans women), she goes on to talk about various cultures around the world and how people we would call trans women in the west engage in barbaric self mutilation - she doesn't even tried to hide the overt racist overtones in describing people of colour in exploited nations this way, she evokes every racist trope you can imagine, painting them as 'backwards' 'savages' etc. If you know your feminist history, you'll know that this all started with Sheila Jeffrey's book 'the transsexual empire', and the impact it had on Greer is obvious if you've read 'The Female Eunuch'. Greer, like Jeffreys, seems to think there's some kind of transgender conspiracy to degrade Real Wombyn and force them into enslavement a la Immortan Joe in Mad Max, it's perplexing. Also bizarre is the fact that she claims to care about Aboriginal Australians to the point where she's left the country and won't come back until and unless she's given permission (even though there's no central governing body who could do so). Does her care and concern extend to Sistergirls (Aboriginal Australian trans women)? Somehow I doubt it, and I'm sure she'd gleefully use all the a or racist tropes against them as well.
Her meditations on things like plastic surgery, the relationships women have to other people (daughter, wife, mother) are pretty uninspired, I can't recall anything noteworthy about them. She does talk about rape in a social psychological context and how we (as a society) think of penises as being violent and scary when in truth, rape is often perpetrated with foreign objects so a penis isn't even required. Oddly enough, her discussion of this subject would, to anyone who isn't a raging bigot, provide yet more reasons as to why trans women aren't a threat or a danger to trans women but, like her discussions of how flimsy biological sex is in 'the female eunuch', her dedication to her hatred of trans women trumps her own research and ideas.
Really, the only thing that's worth reading is the chapter about male violence, but you can't quote it or share it cos then you have to admit to reading Greer and who's going to put their hand up to that?
To summarise, Greer should've taken her own advice and stopped after 'the female eunuch'.
January 28, 2012
I couldn't finish this - Germaine Greer is a posh version of those angry women who button-hole you and start ranting on about what a dreadful mess the council/the management/the government are making of things. 'It's terrible. Someone should do something.' It's always other people who are getting it wrong! She swings from topic to topic making tight, angry, sweeping statements. This book is not really about what she says she's writing about. It's about how angry GG is.
I don't think this attitude is modern or helpful. Mostly, our complex modern world is made up of people trying to do the best they can. Tolerance, discussion and credit where it's due seems the best way to improve what is already a pretty good effort!
I don't think this attitude is modern or helpful. Mostly, our complex modern world is made up of people trying to do the best they can. Tolerance, discussion and credit where it's due seems the best way to improve what is already a pretty good effort!
September 2, 2021
"Agent provocateur" is right: all flash and no fashion. Greer talks a big game, but seems more interested in the shit-stirring than any meaningful progress (since changing the world for the better is, as we know, a battle of miserable inches). The obsessive focus on wombs and pregnancy and childbirth and menstruation also seemed a tad leery; I get it, women make babies or whatever, cool, can we move on to the part where women are being oppressed? Or at least say something meaningful about reproductive healthcare. And for fuck's sake, Germaine, quit referencing Freud's nonsense!
July 29, 2009
'It's time to get angry again' - Germaine Greer
July 1, 2013
There's a reason her name is synonymous with the women's movement. It's because of books like this!
November 3, 2017
I wanted to like this, because I secretly identify more with second-wave than third-wave feminists. But I found this very disappointing on the whole. Her arguments ramble and are poorly supported; most of the chapters are filled with weak (but somewhat wild and universally applicable) conjectures based on one example she heard about in a British newspaper. I like and agree with one of her central assertions, that feminists should be focused on liberation instead of equality, and I wish the book had unpacked that argument instead of jumping from increasingly random topics for 300 pages.
February 3, 2013
Interesting essays about many aspects of womanhood / a woman's life. A bit dated, because the book was published at the beginning of the 2000s and so the author states statistics and numbers from the late 90s - but that does not matter that much, because I think that many problems women are facing are still present nowadays and unfortunately far from solved.
March 4, 2011
A friend in my archaology lecture at the University of Edinburgh had me go along with her to a reading of it. It introduced me to feminism.
November 12, 2022
A depressing & fury inducing book...but necessary and truthful. (Makes me want to be a misandrist. Teehee.)
There is no point in trying to establish reasons for men's hatred of women because hatred is irrational. A woman trying to understand men's cruelty to women is confronted again by a simple antipathy, which is what sexism means. Sexism is an antipathy to persons of the opposite sex, whether felt by men or women, but in fact felt by men. Though all kinds of women are reviled as man-haters, no woman has ever tortured a powerless man in the way that some men torture powerless women. Women do not have the vast vocabulary of insults for men that all men apply to women every day. Nothing that any Englishman can call anybody is worse than the word "cunt." A prick, though contemptible, is a lovesome chap by comparison. Men whether straight or gay revile cunt. (p. 296)
It is virtually impossible to separate the idea of equality from the idea of similarity. If we accept that men are not free, and that masculinity is as partial an account of maleness as femininity is of femaleness, then equality must be seen to be a poor substitute for liberation. Arguing in terms of equality or difference permits two kinds of neutralizing of pro-feminist pressure: one cites the concept of equality to women's disadvantage, as in the notion that women are entitled to equal pay for work "of equal value" - a meaningless concept that serves to enshrine women's work as permanently subordinate - the other institutionalized the contrast between men and women, treating widows differently from widowers, mothers from fathers, wives from husbands. What we find is that when it is in men's interest to plead equality, they do; when it is in their interests to plead difference, they do. A male soldier who wants the right to wear his hair long pleads equality; a male tennis player who wants to go on being paid twice as much as his mixed doubles partners will plead difference. A man who wants paternity leave will plead equality, a member of the MCC who wants to exclude women will plead difference. Quite the most cynical application of equality rhetoric was made in April 1997 by one of the California clinicians responsible for implanting a fertilized ovum in the untreated womb of a woman who as a result gave birth to a baby at the age of sixty-three. "Men can become fathers in their fifties, sixties and even beyond," he said. "So why not women?" There is in truth no comparison between the way men become fathers at any time of life and the way women become mothers. The passing on of their genes involves men in no risk whatever to their health; pregnancy for a post-menopausal woman involves a complex work-up in which the womb is prepared for its foreign host; the older woman runs an elevated risk of circulatory disorders, stroke, heart attack and the diabetes of pregnancy. The denial of real difference can be as cruel as forcing different-sized feet into a single-size shoe. (p. 320-321)
In exhorting men who have the right to be cruel to other men to abandon their sexist chivalry and extend their cruelty as unsparingly to women, Pearson shows that equality is an utterly conservative aim. Equality is cruel to women because it requires them to duplicate behaviors that they find profoundly alien and disturbing. Men like the masculine world that they have built for themselves; if enough men had not enjoyed what they euphemistically call the "cut and thrust" - the sanctioned brutalities of corporate life - such behavior would never have been institutionalized and women would not now be struggling with it. In constructing its male elit, masculinity society contrives to be cruel to most men, all women and all children. If women can see no future beyond joining the masculinity elite on its own terms, our civilization will become more destructive than ever. There has to be a better way. (p. 322)
There is no point in trying to establish reasons for men's hatred of women because hatred is irrational. A woman trying to understand men's cruelty to women is confronted again by a simple antipathy, which is what sexism means. Sexism is an antipathy to persons of the opposite sex, whether felt by men or women, but in fact felt by men. Though all kinds of women are reviled as man-haters, no woman has ever tortured a powerless man in the way that some men torture powerless women. Women do not have the vast vocabulary of insults for men that all men apply to women every day. Nothing that any Englishman can call anybody is worse than the word "cunt." A prick, though contemptible, is a lovesome chap by comparison. Men whether straight or gay revile cunt. (p. 296)
It is virtually impossible to separate the idea of equality from the idea of similarity. If we accept that men are not free, and that masculinity is as partial an account of maleness as femininity is of femaleness, then equality must be seen to be a poor substitute for liberation. Arguing in terms of equality or difference permits two kinds of neutralizing of pro-feminist pressure: one cites the concept of equality to women's disadvantage, as in the notion that women are entitled to equal pay for work "of equal value" - a meaningless concept that serves to enshrine women's work as permanently subordinate - the other institutionalized the contrast between men and women, treating widows differently from widowers, mothers from fathers, wives from husbands. What we find is that when it is in men's interest to plead equality, they do; when it is in their interests to plead difference, they do. A male soldier who wants the right to wear his hair long pleads equality; a male tennis player who wants to go on being paid twice as much as his mixed doubles partners will plead difference. A man who wants paternity leave will plead equality, a member of the MCC who wants to exclude women will plead difference. Quite the most cynical application of equality rhetoric was made in April 1997 by one of the California clinicians responsible for implanting a fertilized ovum in the untreated womb of a woman who as a result gave birth to a baby at the age of sixty-three. "Men can become fathers in their fifties, sixties and even beyond," he said. "So why not women?" There is in truth no comparison between the way men become fathers at any time of life and the way women become mothers. The passing on of their genes involves men in no risk whatever to their health; pregnancy for a post-menopausal woman involves a complex work-up in which the womb is prepared for its foreign host; the older woman runs an elevated risk of circulatory disorders, stroke, heart attack and the diabetes of pregnancy. The denial of real difference can be as cruel as forcing different-sized feet into a single-size shoe. (p. 320-321)
In exhorting men who have the right to be cruel to other men to abandon their sexist chivalry and extend their cruelty as unsparingly to women, Pearson shows that equality is an utterly conservative aim. Equality is cruel to women because it requires them to duplicate behaviors that they find profoundly alien and disturbing. Men like the masculine world that they have built for themselves; if enough men had not enjoyed what they euphemistically call the "cut and thrust" - the sanctioned brutalities of corporate life - such behavior would never have been institutionalized and women would not now be struggling with it. In constructing its male elit, masculinity society contrives to be cruel to most men, all women and all children. If women can see no future beyond joining the masculinity elite on its own terms, our civilization will become more destructive than ever. There has to be a better way. (p. 322)
August 10, 2017
This is a belated sequel to the classic Female Eunuch, covering much that the first didn't manage. While Eunuch was an eye opener for many housewives and working women it was a little thin on the ground for subjects outside of the oppression of suburbia and its general sexual and intellectual repression of women. This one goes into depth on other, less widely written about, subjects relating to female liberation.
Although highly readable, this is Greer at her fieriest and most incisively critical.
Although highly readable, this is Greer at her fieriest and most incisively critical.
August 14, 2015
Not sure I'd say I liked it. An interesting read though rather depressing I thought. The main thrust seemed to be men really hate women, women hate men, a woman's worst enemy is a man and her second worst enemy is a woman.
Sometimes I think Greer has some insightful things to say and other times I shudder at the things she says. Taste my own period blood? Urgh! No thanks. I don't see how that would empower me as a woman.
Overall I'd say a bleak but fascinating read.
Sometimes I think Greer has some insightful things to say and other times I shudder at the things she says. Taste my own period blood? Urgh! No thanks. I don't see how that would empower me as a woman.
Overall I'd say a bleak but fascinating read.
March 17, 2008
Oh boy how we change over the years. I read this about five years ago and hardly agreed with what I wrote then. I'm not sure whether to leave my rating as a 4 or to remove it but I'm leaving it for now.
All I can say now is, it's such a pity you're such a transphobic arsehole, Greer.
All I can say now is, it's such a pity you're such a transphobic arsehole, Greer.
January 19, 2021
A bad portrait of feminism
I picked this because I liked "female eunuch" and wanted to read more from Greer. But I was disappointed and appalled. There are no real arguments in the book. Her opinions about transsexuality, fatherhood, motherhood are not supported by any good reason (like most of her opinions) and they are very offensive (especially about transsexuality)!
Also, I had to skip most parts because she repeats herself too much.
I picked this because I liked "female eunuch" and wanted to read more from Greer. But I was disappointed and appalled. There are no real arguments in the book. Her opinions about transsexuality, fatherhood, motherhood are not supported by any good reason (like most of her opinions) and they are very offensive (especially about transsexuality)!
Also, I had to skip most parts because she repeats herself too much.
May 22, 2021
I read this book as a teenager and it opened my eyes to feminism and to women's lived experience in a way that I hadn't encountered before. For this, I owe Greer some thanks.
Which it is why it is such a shame to revisit this book and to find it riddled with transphobia, bad arguments, and weirdly regressive views. There may have been a place for Greer's views in the 20th century. But I for one am glad that feminism has moved on. I prefer the gender-chill, trans-positive, and body positive feminism of today to whatever this is.
Which it is why it is such a shame to revisit this book and to find it riddled with transphobia, bad arguments, and weirdly regressive views. There may have been a place for Greer's views in the 20th century. But I for one am glad that feminism has moved on. I prefer the gender-chill, trans-positive, and body positive feminism of today to whatever this is.
August 30, 2024
I found this and the Female Eunuch in my late Granny’s collection of books and I’d heard Greer’s name being spoken about in terms of known/ influential feminists. This was the first feminist text I ever read at 15 and then I will say I felt her passionate and angry tone really refreshing and energising. I picked up the book again recently and now understand the destructive aspects of her toxic, essentialist views of womanhood that form the basis of her appalling transphobia and dedication to her narrow minded version of feminism. Severely outdated.
June 22, 2017
An overall interesting read with some fascinating points which made me think a lot about life as a woman. I found some of Greer's opinions didn't sit well with me and made me feel almost depressed thinking that her world view (men hate women and women should hate men) might be accurate. I don't think it is though, it hasn't been in my experience so far and I'll continue to hope that men and women are more alike than we realise.
December 21, 2017
This book by Germaine Greer was published in 1999, but is still pertinent. I may not agree with her every statement, but I applaud Greer's fearlessness and intelligent approach to a range of difficult topics - and there are many of her statements that I do agree with. I'm not going to write an essay on feminism here, but I am in sympathy with Greer's call for liberation from patriarchy - we should be putting into practice ways of living that are caring of all and inclusive.
December 15, 2020
Life changing book!
This book should be required reading in high school and university.
She shows us with her clear prose and acute social insight what is wrong in our society that many men and women are acculturated to not see. I certainly was one of them.
This book is to be read and reread by anyone who wants a more free and humane society.
This book should be required reading in high school and university.
She shows us with her clear prose and acute social insight what is wrong in our society that many men and women are acculturated to not see. I certainly was one of them.
This book is to be read and reread by anyone who wants a more free and humane society.
February 19, 2025
I found this to be more enjoyable than greers first, but entirely falling short of intersectionality or even world-first women’s rights. This felt too focused on biological womanhood, as opposed to displayed womanhood, and, I feel, this detracted from a lot of the main messages enclosed. Many of her arguments were reliant on the victims in her rants to be hyper-feminine damsels in distress, who were (fear not!!) massive career women and powerhouses (somehow). Perhaps more applicable to women in fairytales, Greers perception of women and the female experience is so rooted in what we now view as the male gaze, the most she can do is argue that it’s feminist not to shave.
The unrealism in this book disappointingly make her arguments fall short of expectation, and I feel she should perhaps not be so celebrated in 2025, for someone who’s narratives of the female experience are limited to what is “acceptable” and does nothing to acknowledge those who cannot sit down with her and talk about their experiences (mainly limited to rich white women in the global north who do not work and have staff so have loads of free time to sit down with Greer and put the world to rights).
For all of her ranting about traitors to the cause, Greer should perhaps veer away from women-bashing (as well as her normal men-bashing), lest she, in all her role as an excluder of non cishet white experiences, have no one else to bash.
Much to be expected from Greer, I am thankful to be of the opinion we have evolved past the need for her.
The unrealism in this book disappointingly make her arguments fall short of expectation, and I feel she should perhaps not be so celebrated in 2025, for someone who’s narratives of the female experience are limited to what is “acceptable” and does nothing to acknowledge those who cannot sit down with her and talk about their experiences (mainly limited to rich white women in the global north who do not work and have staff so have loads of free time to sit down with Greer and put the world to rights).
For all of her ranting about traitors to the cause, Greer should perhaps veer away from women-bashing (as well as her normal men-bashing), lest she, in all her role as an excluder of non cishet white experiences, have no one else to bash.
Much to be expected from Greer, I am thankful to be of the opinion we have evolved past the need for her.
January 10, 2025
It’s been a while since I read this book, so there might be something missing on my end, but here goes my 2 cents, that are based on how I felt after reading this at the time:
This is not a book that includes all women, the views are not here necessarily with the means of bringing us readers a resolution. I see that most readers are upset with how this sound like a rant, how angry her positions are, buy honestly? I love angry women.
Her experience is from the perspective of a white western cis woman, and I think that for the demographic this is a interesting read. There are a lot of aspects on our upbringing that might have gone unnoticed or unexplained and she does shed light to some places where I personally also feel anger towards.
I have seen her stance in sa as a victim herself and although it is not a stance that embraces everyone it did touch me, her point on refusing to call a man’s mush sack of meet a weapon was very refreshing to me, and gave me some relief regarding my own sa experiences.
She isn’t soft, sweet, nice, positive and honestly I appreciate her sharing her personal views and experiences, although it’s done kinda like “facts”, but as a reader I have the autonomy of forming my own opinions about it.
This might not be the feminist piece that brings us all together, or that gives us the tools to make it a better place for us. But it made me question a lot, and sparked anger that has caused me to radicalize even more my stance on feminism. Being brought up as a woman is a truly fascinating and sometimes anger provoking experience.
This is not a book that includes all women, the views are not here necessarily with the means of bringing us readers a resolution. I see that most readers are upset with how this sound like a rant, how angry her positions are, buy honestly? I love angry women.
Her experience is from the perspective of a white western cis woman, and I think that for the demographic this is a interesting read. There are a lot of aspects on our upbringing that might have gone unnoticed or unexplained and she does shed light to some places where I personally also feel anger towards.
I have seen her stance in sa as a victim herself and although it is not a stance that embraces everyone it did touch me, her point on refusing to call a man’s mush sack of meet a weapon was very refreshing to me, and gave me some relief regarding my own sa experiences.
She isn’t soft, sweet, nice, positive and honestly I appreciate her sharing her personal views and experiences, although it’s done kinda like “facts”, but as a reader I have the autonomy of forming my own opinions about it.
This might not be the feminist piece that brings us all together, or that gives us the tools to make it a better place for us. But it made me question a lot, and sparked anger that has caused me to radicalize even more my stance on feminism. Being brought up as a woman is a truly fascinating and sometimes anger provoking experience.
July 8, 2020
Read for an essay, and there is some useful conversation around female bodies and eating disorders. The exploration of the rise of plastic surgery and the ever growing collections of lotions and potions developed by the beauty industry were well written and enlightening at timesm I wouldn't say that Greer reads as an 'angry feminist' as others have said, rather her tone comes across as sarcastic when talking about men.
December 21, 2021
Sobre PJ Harvey y Courtney Love:
"(...) pelo oxigenado y revuelto con las raíces oscuras, cicatrices, cortes, tatuajes y una mezcolanza de churretes de productos cosméticos, como si los hombres a quienes fingen querer intimidar acabasen de violarlas en grupo".
Que esta mujer se haga llamar feminista me parece una vergüenza.
Tremenda basura de libro.
"(...) pelo oxigenado y revuelto con las raíces oscuras, cicatrices, cortes, tatuajes y una mezcolanza de churretes de productos cosméticos, como si los hombres a quienes fingen querer intimidar acabasen de violarlas en grupo".
Que esta mujer se haga llamar feminista me parece una vergüenza.
Tremenda basura de libro.
March 6, 2019
Really tried to persist with this but after slogging my way through seventeen of the self-contained men-hating rants, I had to give up.
I did take a way a few new ideas, but can only conclude that I am not part of the intended audience.
I did take a way a few new ideas, but can only conclude that I am not part of the intended audience.
March 30, 2024
kirja on vuodelta 1999, poimin sen kaverin kirjahyllystä sattumalta ja jäin lukemaan. joitakin kiinnostavia pointteja, vaikka toki feminismi on mennyt eteenpäin 25 vuodessa, kunnes kirjan transfobisuus yllätti. ei jatkoon.
March 6, 2017
I tried, but the majority of what I just read is bullshit.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 77 reviews