<\/p>\n
What is the opposite of misogyny<\/em>?\u00a0 Misanthropy<\/em>?\u00a0 No, that\u2019s the dislike of humankind in general, rather than the specific dislike of males.\u00a0 Try again.\u00a0 Misandry<\/em> is the word.\u00a0 As I type it into Microsoft Word and hit the spacebar, it becomes underlined in red.\u00a0 Misspelled?\u00a0 Quite possibly.\u00a0 No, a quick trip to the Oxford English dictionary confirms spelling and definition.\u00a0 So misandry <\/em>simply isn\u2019t recognized by Microsoft technology.\u00a0 It\u2019s unfamiliar.\u00a0 It\u2019s defamiliar.\u00a0 Perhaps, this just represents one of many omitted words and names, or maybe it signifies something greater and more telling about (wo)men and technology.\u00a0 Regardless, it offers point of entry into discussing Joanna Russ\u2019 The Female Man<\/span>.<\/p>\n Though Russ\u2019 The Female Man <\/span>can fit into many classifications of literature (e.g. postmodern fiction, science fiction, a feminist work, etc.), I am interested in how it functions as a satire.\u00a0 At the end of the text, Jael proposes the women (Janet, Jeannine, and Joanna) \u201cdo business with [Jael\u2019s] Womanland\u201d (211) and to incorporate women soldiers from each of their individual realities to wage war on the men.\u00a0 Jeannine and Joanna quickly acquiesce.\u00a0 Jeannie states, \u201c\u2018Oh sure, I don\u2019t mind.\u00a0 You can bring in all the soldiers you want.\u00a0 You can take the whole place over; I wish you would\u2019\u201d (Russ 211).\u00a0 The response is pert and off-the-cuff.\u00a0 Oh sure.\u00a0 Why not? <\/em> Well, why not?<\/p>\n Janet, the woman from the all-female Whileaway, alone, resists.\u00a0 Moreover, she refuses Jael\u2019s retelling of the plague as an act of female aggression.\u00a0 It is unclear whether this resistance comes from inexperience with males, stupidity, or a more simplistic view of conflict resolution (or perhaps, like Microsoft, Janet does not have a word for this construct).\u00a0 Still, we don\u2019t know why she would resist or why anyone should resist?\u00a0 At first glance, it seems<\/em> perfectly logical.<\/p>\n What\u2019s wrong with a rebalancing of power?\u00a0 In Jeannine and Joann\u2019s worlds, when woman are not being infantilized by the men in the text, they are being raped or arranging their lives so that they won\u2019t be vulnerable to rape.\u00a0 Clearly, a master-slave relationship is at work, dominating the women at every opportunity, denying them \u201cadult independence\u2014namely money\u201d (118).\u00a0 It is only through technology that Whileaway and Womanland the women regain their power.\u00a0 Why not take this to the next level?<\/p>\n Given the endless possibilities of technology, an inter-dimensional war with men may throw the balance of power in favor of the women.\u00a0 Most of the characters find that idea fairly attractive.\u00a0 In fact, Jael\u2019s logic reflects that of an oppressed people made free.\u00a0 Rather than preach the ills of subjection, the free must, in turn, oppress to maintain their freedom.\u00a0 Freedom cannot exist without oppression; oppression cannot exist without freedom.\u00a0 On second glance, it simply replaces one societal ill with another: misandry with misogyny.\u00a0 So what\u2019s the point of this exercise?\u00a0 By promoting misandry, The Female Man<\/span> would undercut all its previous points about the master-slave power in male-female relations.\u00a0 But it doesn\u2019t just do that.\u00a0 Misandry<\/em> defamiliarizes misogyny<\/em>.\u00a0 It gives us a new word, a new point of reference, a new context to highlight an old referential.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What is the opposite of misogyny?\u00a0 Misanthropy?\u00a0 No, that\u2019s the dislike of humankind in general, rather than the specific dislike of males.\u00a0 Try again.\u00a0 Misandry is the word.\u00a0 As I type it into Microsoft Word and hit the spacebar, it becomes underlined in red.\u00a0 Misspelled?\u00a0 Quite possibly.\u00a0 No, a quick trip to the Oxford English … Continue reading A Misandristic Proposal<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[42,52,23,21,34,13,51],"class_list":["post-405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-week-9-female-man","tag-gothic","tag-joanna-russ","tag-satire","tag-science-fiction","tag-space","tag-technology","tag-the-female-man"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=405"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":467,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405\/revisions\/467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}