Today I was bored at work, so I decided to drive down to the public library and get a book on CD.  As a PhD student, I often feel an overwhelming sense of guilt whenever I pick up a non-dissertation related book - as if reading it would be tantamount to cheating on my dissertation.  Books on CD, however, are fair game because I listen to them in my car, where it would be nearly impossible to read, write and crunch numbers. 

So, today's book is Maureen Dowd's 2005 book "Are Men Necessary?: When Sexes Collide" and so far I'm feeling a bit disappointed.  Granted, I'm only about halfway through the first CD.  If the disappointment continues, this could become the blog equivalent of a mini-series. 

Although my experiences of her have been largely limited to her guest panelist segments on Real Time with Bill Maher, I've always really liked Maureen Dowd.  In some ways, the book began with great promise when I found out that she grew up in a Catholic family with a police officer as a father - two things I didn't know we had in common.  We also both have mothers who are huge fans of men, especially for heavy lifting, and somehow both turned out incredibly liberal and independent. 

The book begins by talking about sexual politics and changes in our culture over the years.  From the flapper girls of the 1920s who were smoking, drinking and dressing like men, to the domesticity of the 1950s when women resumed their rightful place in the kitchen, to the hippie chics of the 1970s who were smoking, drinking and wearing unisex jeans, to the domesticity of the 1980s when women once again stopped caring about being equal to men, to the 2000s when they started wearing miniskirts on television while advocating for the systematic removal of women's rights (I believe she was looking at a picture of Ann Coulter when she wrote this, but it could have been Sarah Palin).  It is interesting how cyclical things are. 

What really bugs me right now is her section on popular generational books like "The Rules" and "How to catch a husband."  It's not Maureen Dowd that I have a problem with, but the ideas that she is reading off from these books.  I'm sure she's building up to something, but likely won't find out for several days.  These books basically tell you that the only way that you will ever be loved by a man is to be quiet, ladylike, mysterious, and willing to place his interests above yours - basically, Stepford.  With advice like that, is there any wonder why half of all marriages end in divorce?  

To be clear - yes, I am a feminist.  I'm not a Carrie Bradshaw "Sleep with enough men and you'll eventually find one who respects you, or at least one who will refinish your floors, one who will buy your old apartment for you and one who will buy you an apartment on Fifth Avenue" type of feminist.  While I do own my fair share of faux-flannel, I also don't see myself as a "No make-up wearing, man-hating feminist."  I'm sort of in-between.  I like men a lot.  I generally have more male friends than female ones, albeit mostly gay, married or otherwise undesirable.  Although I haven't personally been on a date in the past five years that I've been trapped in the no-mans-land that is Tallahassee (my latest dating tagline is "I like men, just not most of them"), I still have an appreciation for men who open car doors and pay for dinner.  I'm also not averse to occasionally picking up the check.  I find notions of "women and children first" to be antiquated and anti-feminist.  What makes the life of a man less valuable than that of a woman?

However, at the end of the day, I'm always going to be me.  I'm not going to laugh at things that aren't funny or spend time with someone out of some banal need to procreate that I don't find interesting or who has no shot at understanding who I am or what I want in life.  I'm also not going to temper my personality or fain interest in things that don't really interest me so that others will like me, male or female.  That is the curse of being me, and I'm sure that as a result, I will lead a very lonely life and I'm ok with that.