The Last Time I Wore A Dress Review

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(More customer reviews)Daphne Scholinski wore the label of "inappropriate female" for much of her life. As a tomboy youth, she was often mistaken for male. On one grocery trip, a clerk caught the "boy" for using the women's restroom. When the clerk confronted Daphne's father, instead of correcting the clerk, her weary father slapped her hand: "Bad boy. I told you to stop doing that."
In 1981, at odds with her raging father and abandoned by her free-thinking mother, 15-year-old Daphne was committed to a psychiatric hospital, at which a treatment plan was designed to help her identify as a "sexual female." Over one million dollars (you read that right) of insurance money was spent on three years of make-up lessons, encouragement of flirtation with males, and points for hugging male staff members. Daphne was indirectly blamed for all her family's troubles and told that her depression and confusion were symptoms of her improper gender identification. Desperate for a mothering relationship, she latched onto nurses, begging to be adopted by the most compassionate one, and attempting suicide when her efforts were rebuffed.
In a series of institutions, Daphne busied herself working the system to earn more privileges. To entertain themselves, she and other patients competed to shock the staff and get unusual diagnoses added to their charts. Their every movement was already analyzed and reduced into psychobabble, so why not? Daphne often embellished alcohol and drug abuse to make her case more interesting, but she realized she was out her league when she was transferred to rehab. All the while, a host of therapists and staff failed to identify sexual assault in Daphne's life, both before and *after* entering treatment. At age 18, when Daphne's father's insurance money ran out, she was discharged as no more "appropriate" a female than when she entered, but without a traditional high school experience or preparation for the world, and a few more years of victimhood under her belt.
Daphne Scholinski survived institutionalization with her intelligence, sense of humor, and sassy rebellious spirit. Every time she was transferred, she felt hope few her new situation. She writes that she knows she was lucky to be middle-class and be offered treatment, instead of being kicked onto the streets. As an adult, Daphne channeled her traumatic past into an artistic career, and now lives as Dylan Scholinski in the San Francisco area (Dylan's identification as male occurred after the 1997 publication of this memoir). I only discovered Scholinski's gender identity when I started composing my review, and in many ways, Daphne's "actual" gender identity is irrelevant to this story of the failure of the mental health system to help a depressed youth and her family.

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At 15, Daphne Scholinski was committed to a mental institution and awarded the dubious diagnosis of "Gender Identity Disorder". "The voice of Daphne's teenage self--bewildered, frank, aching, and defiant--is so vivid it's like hearing a confidence whispered across a dormitory room deep in the night".--"Harper's Bazaar".

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The Flipside of Feminism: What Conservative Women Know -- and Men Can't Say Review

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(More customer reviews)The Flipside of Feminism is a refreshing look at the realities of women's lives and the attempts of the feminist establishment to push women into a box that fits their delusions. Going from unveiling Betty Freidan's miserable marriage to the failed promises of a utopian world where men and family are marginal, this book explains, in plain language, why many women are unfulfilled trying to live the media ideal of what their life should be. It also offers a path back to a saner and balanced life that supports what women truly want - by a definition that Freud and Gloria Steinem would not continence. If you are a woman not planning to live with either of these two people, I would recommend this book. It is very instructive reading for men on what went wrong with relationships since the 1970s and what to look for and advocate in both women's and men's attitudes to repair the damage.

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What if everything you've been told about women in America is wrong? What if what your college professors taught you - along with television, movies, books, magazine articles, and even news reports - have all been lies or distortions?

Since the 1960s, American feminists have set themselves up as the arbiters of all things female. Their policies have dominated the social and political landscape. The "spin sisters" in the media (aptly named by Myrna Blyth in her book of the same name) and their cohorts in academia are committed feminists. Consequently, everything Americans know -- or think they know -- about marriage, kids, sex, education, politics, gender roles, and work/family balance, has been filtered through a left-wing lens.

But what if conservative women are in the best position to empower American women?

Forty years have passed since the so-called women's movement claimed to liberate women from preconceived notions of what it means to be female -- and the results are in. The latest statistics from the National Bureau of Economic Research show that as women have gained more freedom, more education, and more power, they have become less happy.

Enough, say Suzanne Venker, an emerging young author, and veteran warrior Phyllis Schlafly. It's time to liberate America from feminism's dead-end road. Cast off the ideology that preaches faux empowerment and liberation from men and marriage. While modern women enjoy unprecedented freedom and opportunities, Venker and Schlafly argue that this progress is not the result of feminism.

Women's progress has been a natural evolution - due in large part to men's contributions. American men are not a patriarchal bunch, as feminists claim. They have, in fact, aided women's progress. And like women, they have been just as harmed by the feminist movement.

In The Flipside of Feminism, Venker and Schlafly provide readers with a new view of women in America -- one that runs counter to what Americans have been besieged with for decades. Their book demonstrates that conservative women are, in fact, the most liberated women in America and the folks to whom young people should be turning for advice. Their confident and rational approach to the battle of the sexes is precisely what America needs.

The authors advocate a common-sense approach to the issue of marriage and motherhood. Rather than belabor the tired notion of balance, they provide a step-by-step guide for how women can embrace their maternal desire, maintain strong marriages and also carve out a life of their own. The answer lies in a concept known as sequencing.

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Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty Review

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(More customer reviews)The Survival of the Prettiest is an eminently readable, wisdom-filled, witty and very well-documented report on the human concept and experience of beauty and its utility, especially human beauty, or the perceived lack thereof. It is an example of a way of looking at ourselves that is becoming increasingly of value, both in terms of the insights it affords, and in the way it frees us from the muddled delusions of the past. This point of view is from the fledgling science of evolutionary psychology of which Professor Etcoff is a very persuasive spokesperson and practitioner.
"Pretty is as pretty does" and "Beauty is truth, truth beauty,-that is all/Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know" (Keats) are two widely differing attitudes toward beauty, but each in its way contains an essence of truth. However, rather than bring these or other presuppositions to what Etcoff has to say (as some readers have), I suggest we actually read what she has to say, and then draw our conclusions. What I predict will happen is that even the most ardent beauty-phobe will find something of value and enlightenment here.
Unfortunately (and understandably) not all readers have been able to approach the subject with an open mind. I noticed that an anonymous "reader" brought anorexia and bulimia into the discussion and blamed the rise in their instance on "media images" of beauty. No doubt media images are partly to blame (if indeed these disorders have become more prevalent). But it is more likely that the apparent rise in anorexia and bulimia is the result of the fact that the counseling professions now recognize that these eating disorders exist. In the past the symptoms had no commonly agreed upon locus such as "anorexia" or "bulimia" to adhere to, so we really do not know how prevalent they were. But more important in terms of being a public health problem is the enormous increase in obesity in this country, now often identified as an eating disorder due to "carbohydrate intolerance." The numbers of obese Americans hugely overwhelms the number of anorexics and bulimics, and obesity can hardly be blamed on "media images." We can point to the "super-sizing" of fast food dispensers if we want to fix blame. However--and this is one of Etcoff's important points--it is not the media or advertizing that is primarily responsible for our perceptions of beauty (or our tendency to eat too much), but an inborn, predisposition that has proven adaptive in the past that makes us find some people pretty and some others not so pretty.
Another "reader" claimed that Etcoff did not consider ideas of beauty in other cultures. That is incorrect, as anybody who has read the book knows. She devotes considerable ink to standards and ideals of beauty in cultures around the world and her observation is that ideals of beauty tend to be culture specific; that is, Ache tribesmen find their women and women of a neighboring tribe more attractive than European women. Indeed Etcoff reports that Asians typically find European and African noses not attractive because they are too large. Ache tribesmen actually made fun of the Caucasian anthropologists calling them "pyta puku, meaning longnose." (p. 139) Etcoff concluded that there were differences in standards of beauty, but that there were also similarities, and she goes into considerable depth detailing the studies. (See especially Chapter Five, "Feature Presentation.")
Etcoff is also criticized for her many literary quotes, references and allusions. But to my discernment they are a strength of the book and not a weakness. A very important part of our understanding of human nature comes not from the relatively new knowledge called science but from religion and literature. Etcoff is doubly wise to reference what great writers, statesmen and religions leaders have said about our ideas of beauty, first because what they say is worth knowing, and second because they express themselves so well. The anonymous reviewer who claimed to be a scientist perhaps ought to expand his or her reading to include wisdom from other sources, as has Etcoff. I just wish half of the writers writing today were one half as eloquent and readable as is Etcoff; and I'd settle for one-quarter as wise.
One of the significant things that this book does is to show that evolutionary psychology, despite the beliefs of its critics (and even that of some of its practitioners), is not limited to using insights from biological evolution alone, but from cultural evolution as well. Etcoff's book is a splendid example of this wiser, broader, synergistically more powerful employment.

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Scoreboard, Baby: A Story of College Football, Crime, and Complicity Review

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(More customer reviews)Armstrong, Ken and Nick Perry. Scoreboard, Baby: A Story of College Football, Crime, and Complicity. Cloth: alk.paper: 372 pages. University of Nebraska Press (2010) ISBN -978-0-8032-2810-8. Includes bibliographic references and index.
Reviewed by Dick Stull

The title, "Scoreboard, Baby" was former Colorado Buffaloes football coach Rick Neuheisel's retort to comments made by the losing coach who accused Neuheisel's players of illegal tactics on the field. A few years later Neuheisel was paid $1,000,000 to revive the Washington Huskies football program. He delivered a "mystical, magical dream season" in the year 2000, culminating in a dramatic Rose Bowl victory. Armstrong and Perry's thorough and compelling investigation reveals the facts behind a different scoreboard. Four of every five players failed to meet minimum University of Washington admission standards. One out of three players graduated. Twenty-four players on Washington's 2000 football team were arrested or charged with some crime during their years at the university. The authors write:
"Some players do serious damage. Some get used up. A city looks away and the game goes on. Variations of this story-more about culture than sports, more about a community than a team - can be found in colleges across the country. Florida State, Ohio State, Texas A&M. Washington isn't an aberration, it is an example."
Through extensive review of public records and interviews, the authors detail the complicity of Seattle community members, law enforcement officials, coaches, players, members of the legal profession, local media, and the university in this tale of "twisted values."
A sorority student is raped, allegedly by another player. Circumstantial and DNA evidence appears to be conclusive - but not so in the eyes of the prosecutors. The student, a highly personable and outstanding academic achiever, has her life irrevocably changed. Her mother reports her eyes are simply "empty." Police records in this case and in others are "sealed," community service or time served is designated "after football season," "domestic abuse" is not reported, an armed robbery and shooting investigation is stalled. There is the sad Greek tragedy of a fearless, much-admired player who is paralyzed while making a vicious hit. He becomes a martyred symbol for his team and the community but his violent past presents a difficult moral conflict for reporters "in the know" who would like the greater narrative to be about redemption for the player and the team's season.
Armstrong and Perry's skillful setting up of some of the key players' back-stories often reveal the athletes' Jekyll-and-Hyde personalities. Many are well-spoken and are thought of highly by their teammates, their coaches, and members of the media -- but many also show extreme entitlement and ugly, violent behavior.The authors' recounting of the personal hardships encountered by many of them during their early years gives the reader enough context to understand but not excuse their actions. The "demands" of football and their own unrealistic expectations of future stardom make it hard to imagine that all but the most capable, motivated, and highly disciplined of them can get a meaningful academic experience - there simply aren't enough hours in the day. The authors point out the insular world of football, a culture unto itself within the greater university. These things are not new to anyone familiar with division 1 sports, but
it's the dogged reporting of the day-by-day devils in the details that makes Scoreboard, Baby so compelling. You simply can't rationalize away so many facts into simplistic moralistic story-lines.
There are of course courageous and honorable individuals. An academically unexceptional athlete is encouraged by one of his coaches and a committed, caring college advisor to go abroad. He becomes the University of Washington's first athlete to win the Mary Gate's scholarship (established by Microsoft founder Bill Gates) in recognition of undergraduate research or leadership potential. He travels to South Africa and goes through a transformative experience at a small rural school and gets an advanced degree. There are also hardworking people in the system that do their best to do the right thing. Some police investigators go beyond the call of duty. One, a female officer, shows uncommon tenacity and compassion for the rape victim in trying to obtain justice. Another officer refuses to let up on an investigation of a robbery and shooting case involving a star player though he knows it is a highly sensitive community issue.
A further plus of the book is the authors' descriptions of some of the season's games themselves, and, in particular, the Rose Bowl thriller against Purdue. The gripping stories behind the scenes ratchet up the drama and ironies. You are momentarily transported - "The game's the thing!"Alas, this silver lining doesn't convince the reader that the dark clouds of greed won't eventually rain on any parade, however. You already know too much.
The authors' epilogue in Scoreboard, Baby makes it hard to imagine that any fundamental systemic changes can alter the all-too-human temptation towards riches, power and fame - greed is still "good." People will find a way to get around regulations whether it's the SEC and Wall Street, the Minerals Management Service and oil drilling, or the NCAA and college football. Like the revolving door where lobbyists switch hats with regulators on Capitol Hill, coaches and administrators are recycled, reforms come quickly after scandal, but human nature regresses to the mean reality of Mammon.
Past is Prologue? If there was ever a "bread and circuses" break from reality, college football is as good as it gets. The authors set us up in the first chapter. And they're right, as any college football fan can attest. There's nothing quite like the pageantry, the color, the marching bands, the drama, the passion - the thrill of the game. Decades ago in my teens, my dad and I attended a Stanford-USC football game that had Rose Bowl and national championship implications written all over it. Biting into our hot dogs amidst the din just before the opening kickoff, my dad turned to me and said laughingly, "When I was your age my father took me to a meat-packing plant. After seeing what goes into one of these, I couldn't eat a hot dog for 20 years!" Then came the kickoff, and God, what a game it was! Scoreboard, Baby is a much harder truth to digest.
Dick Stull
Arcata, CA



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The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future Review

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(More customer reviews)The Chalice and the Blade describes idyllic, Goddess-worshipping societies that Eisler believes existed several thousand years ago in eastern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean. She presents images of agrarian villages that had no defensive fortifications because there was no war. The communities were non-violent and egalitarian. There was no hierarchy and no sexism. There was no class system or great disparities of wealth. The people were deeply spiritual and practiced free love. They were profoundly connected to the natural world. Eventually, however, aggressive warrior nomads from the east (patriarchal peoples who worshipped male sky gods) destroyed these peaceful, Goddess-worshipping communities. The warrior nomads killed the men, raped the women, and took the children as slaves. The Goddess was suppressed and the patriarchy has ruled ever since.
Reisler invites the reader to mourn the loss of ancient communities, and reconnect with their underlying values. I read the book as a refreshing, life-affirming counter-myth that challenges the abusive aspects of our patriarchal traditions. The Chalice and the Blade celebrates the value of partnership, equality, collaboration, non-violence, and connectedness to nature. Eisler gives us some sense of the enormous power to heal that resides in the repressed feminine and lunar realms. However, I would offer the following cautions:
1. It is possible that Eisler has extrapolated a few scraps of evidence into a highly idealized society that didn't really exist.
2 . It is possible that Eisler's vision is pyschologically naive in the sense that everything has a shadow or dark side. If the Goddess societies existed, they would, by necessity, have a dark side.
3. It is possible that the problem with western society is not that it has a male image of divinity but that it has a one-sided, gender-specific image of divinity. Substituting a Goddess-based image might not lead to Utopia, but might bring its own set of problems.Perhaps we need images of the divine that honor both genders.
4. Eisler is a nationally known advocate of partnership models as superior forms of human interaction in contrast to "dominator" approaches. Faced with the choice of partnership or domination, the former is clearly preferable. A more neutral way of distinguishing between these two approaches would be to substitute consensus for partnership and hierarchy for domination. It is possible that each approach - consensus and hierarchy - has its own merits and drawbacks. The negative shadow of consensus systems might be passive aggression, confusion, paralysis. It is possible that when grounded with love and respect, hierarchical systems can be generative and empowering.
I suspect that the humanity would best be served by a society that reveres both male and female, earth and sky, soul and spirit, hierarchy and collaboration, passion and gentleness - a social order with a pluralistic approach that reflects mythopoetic diversity and celebrates consciousness. Yet, whatever the book's shortcomings I must confess that my heart is with Eisler.

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Sisters Eight Book 1: Annie's Adventures Review

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(More customer reviews)This introduction to The Sisters Eight is charming, ridiculous, mysterious and strange. The octuplets, whose were each born one minute apart, find on New Year's Eve that their parents (dad's a model, mom's a scientist) are missing, via a note left for them telling them they will each discover a power and a gift. Annie, the oldest, takes charge, as they try to hide their parentless state from their mean teacher, the McG, and the kindly mechanic, Pete, who manages to somehow catch on (despite Annie's disguising her voice as her dad and putting on a fake moustache).
Oh, and there's talking cats and petulant sisters and a cute boy named Will. These sisters are zany and adorable, and their antics and love for pink frosting, along with the sense of drama infused by Baratz-Logsted and her co-authors, husband Greg Logsted (author of the YA novel Something Happened) and 8-year-old daughter Jackie, make this a series I'm looking forward to reading.
Some of the naming conventions, like each cat corresponding to a sister, get a little outrageous, but the fun inventions, like shoes they use to walk on the ceiling and a misprogrammed robot maid, are absolutely delightful. The girls are wise beyond their years (some of them), but still have to deal with basic kid stuff like school and, oh yeah, not so basic stuff like their missing parents. They mostly take the disappearance in stride and focus on their daily tasks. It's hard to get a sense of each and every one of them from the book, though sourpuss Rebecca stands out. These little girls know what they like (shopping for toys, their cute classmate Will) and what they don't (their teacher, for one, and their nosy neighbor, The Wicket).
The sisters will likely appeal to Lemony Snicket fans, though while they too face tragedy, the story isn't grim (or Grimm) at all. I might have preferred that each girl tell her own story in the first person rather than first person plural, but it still works. This is a fun read and will appeal to kids who wonder just how much fun it would be to have their parents out of the house; in Annie's Adventures, it's fun but takes some grownup smarts to keep their busy, octuplet and animal-filled household running smoothly (with a little help from their friend Pete, whose knowing kindness makes him a standout character).

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A rather large problem has befallen the Huit girls. (Sisters, actually. Octuplets to be exact.) One particular New Year's Eve, the girls wait for their mommy to bring them hot chocolate and their daddy to return with more wood for the fire. But they don't. Mommy and Daddy, that is. They're gone. Poof! Maybe dead-no one knows for sure.You must see the problem here. Eight little girls on their own, no mommy or daddy to take care of them. This is not a good thing.So now these little girls, must take care of themselves. Get to school, cook the meals, feed the cats (eight of them, too), and pay the bills. They can't ask for help, oh no. Any self-respecting adult would surely call in social services, and those well-meaning people would have to split them up. After losing their parents, being split up would be completely unbearable.At the same time, the question remains:What happened to Mommy and Daddy? The Sisters Eight (as they are called, affectionately and otherwise) are determined to find out. Luckily, they do seem to have someone or something helping them. Notes keep appearing behind a loose brick in the fireplace.It's a good old-fashioned mystery with missing (or dead) parents, nosy neighbors, talking refrigerators, foul-smelling fruitcake (is there any other kind?), and even a little magic. Eight little girls, eight cats, and one big mystery-let the fun begin!Annie's Adventures, wherein the girls' parents go missing (or die) and the girls learn each one has a power and gift. Annie, being the oldest, is the first to discover hers.

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Women Who Run with the Wolves Review

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(More customer reviews)Reading the other customer reviews, I find it very interesting to see how different they are, and how different many of them are from my experience.
I was surprised to read the review on this page by the woman who believes we ought to read Jung first (or instead). My experience is the opposite; when I've picked up Jung's original works I've found them tough to follow, but this book I found very accessible and useful. I don't think the comparison between the Bible and a tv evangelist is at all fair. It's more like the difference between Strunk & White and the Oxford English Dictionary. The OED is wonderful, but Strunk & White is the one that is most likely to help you become a better writer.
Although I think of myself as a creative person, I tend to downplay that part of myself and to lead with my left brain, as it were. Reading this book I felt like I was being given a path to my inner wellspring. I felt that I had at last found water for a thirst I hadn't quite been able to identify until now.
This book is about one's inner life. It is not a how-to book, it's not political (except in the sense that the personal is political), and I didn't feel that it over-emphasized "what's wrong with you," as another reader put it. It does continually nudge one to think about what might be wrong: many many women are cut off from their own preferences, their own inner selves, because they feel pressured to conform with societal norms. Many societal norms are, in my opinion, quite damaging and inappropriate. It is very easy in American society to get the impression that women should be seen and not heard. Women are still encouraged to focus on how we look, to be compliant, to act ladylike and be nice even when we are being denigrated, and to stand by our man no matter what. We are encouraged to help others at the expense of our own happiness, and many many of us fall into this trap without even realizing it. We think it is normal to put ourselves last, and we lose touch with the shames and the fears that keep us from being happy, wiping the subject of happiness off the table with a dismissive hand as something that is too indulgent or not important.
This book helped me realize the ways in which I stand in my own way, and it gave me courage and inspiration.
The author is not only a Jungian analyst, but a storyteller. She is steeped in the traditions of storytelling from both the Latin and the Hungarian sides of her family, and I very much enjoyed the ways in which she uses this legacy of the storyteller as healer to make her points. I never thought of storytelling in this way before, but reading this book I found it to be true. (I feel that her stories have helped heal me.) I am a storyteller myself, of a sort, so for me the book was a kind of homecoming. If you have ever wondered why fairy tales seem so cruel and peculiar, you will find the answers in this book. Fairy tales have been mangled in the translation, but this author shows you where they came from and what they are really about.
While I am a huge believer in free-market capitalism, growth, business, and civilization (as opposed to back-to-nature Green-ery), I have tremendous concerns about the increasingly violent and impersonal nature of our society. This book shows you how to cultivate a healing, loving attitude toward the world without becoming a doormat--quite the contrary, it shows how love can give you more strength and power than you'll ever find in a boardroom.
Another review on this page criticized the book for not putting these issues into a broader context of one's life. It took twenty years for this author to distill her wisdom of storytelling and her knowledge of Jungian archetypes into this lovely, readable book. For me, that's quite an accomplishment. I'm more than willing to take it the rest of the way myself.

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Blueprints for Building Better Girls: Fiction Review

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(More customer reviews)I want to buy 1,000 copies of Blueprints for Building Better Girls and hand them out to random passersby on the streets. I want this book to be read, immediately, by everyone I've ever known or will ever know. This is incredible stuff. Easily the best book I've read this year. Possibly the best book I've ever read.
It is a series of short stories that center around women and the relationships we have with one another, with our lovers, with our spouses, our children, our parents. Most of the stories intersect with another story in some way. There was laughing, there was crying. There was one particular 8 page section that I had to read out of the corner of my eye because I just couldn't face it head on.
It is brave, and honest, and exceptional in every way. This book made me a wiser person.
Thank you, Goodreads First Reads program for sending me this book and thank you Elissa Schappell for writing it.

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Elissa Schappell's Use Me introduced us to a writer of extraordinary talent, whose "sharp, beautiful, and off-kilter debut" (Jennifer Egan) garnered critical acclaim and captivated readers. In Blueprints for Building Better Girls, her highly anticipated follow-up, she has crafted another provocative, keenly observed, and wickedly smart work of fiction that maps America's shifting cultural landscape from the late 1970s to the present day. In these eight darkly funny linked stories, Schappell delves into the lives of an eclectic cast of archetypal female characters—from the high school slut to the good girl, the struggling artist to the college party girl, the wife who yearns for a child to the reluctant mother— to explore the commonly shared but rarely spoken of experiences that build girls into women and women into wives and mothers. In "Monsters of the Deep," teenage Heather struggles to balance intimacy with a bad reputation; years later in "I'm Only Going to Tell You This Once," she must reconcile her memories of the past with her role as the mother of an adolescent son. In "The Joy of Cooking," a phone conversation between Emily, a recovering anorexic, and her mother explores a complex bond; in "Elephant" we see Emily's sister, Paige, finally able to voice her ambivalent feelings about motherhood to her new best friend, Charlotte. And in "Are You Comfortable?" we meet a twenty-one-year-old Charlotte cracking under the burden of a dark secret, the effects of which push Bender, a troubled college girl, to the edge in "Out of the Blue into the Black." Weaving in and out of one another's lives, whether connected by blood, or friendship, or necessity, these women create deep and lasting impressions. In revealing all their vulnerabilities and twisting our preconceived notions of who they are, Elissa Schappell, with dazzling wit and poignant prose, has forever altered how we think about the nature of female identity and how it evolves.

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