a book I did not finish
Sep. 12th, 2010 12:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
coraaDear Memoirist:
When the men you work with are all painted in glowing colors—even the chef who deliberately smushed salmon egg pate all over your face for fun, the fellow-student who poked you in the ass with a trussing needle, and the fellow student who sexually harasses you all the time—but all the women are described as catty, grasping, and evil, I begin to suspect that it is you, and not every other woman on earth, who has the problem.
When I notice that all of your insults of the women are gendered in ugly ways ("harpy," "witch," "lewd giggle," "middle-aged biddy," "bitch," "she tried too hard," "bleat"), or are insults of their appearance ("piercing laughter that shook her plump frame and caused her significant backside to sway like a cow having an epileptic seizure," "distinctly less than gorgeous, with her flaccid lips, protuberant eyes, and mud-colored irises, to say nothing of the truly enormous contours of her lower half—her ass was a cautionary tale of what could happen to someone who spent all their time in the kitchen," "Mimi looked pretty good for her age, but it was definitely a case of mutton dressed as lamb, as my mother would have said," "her pug nose almost twitching with anticipation") — when I notice that, my tendency to believe that they are the problem goes down another sizeable notch.
Oh, but it's okay, because you know why all these woman are so hateful. About Chef Cyndee, "I blamed it on Tucker’s super-nerd habit of asking Cyndee endless questions about the food, the recipes, the curriculum, and kitchen lore in general, none of which she knew the answers to, and Tucker blamed me for being blond and for smiling too much. I think we were both right." (Stupidity and jealousy makes women evil.) About Mimi, the Middle Eastern fellow student, "Mimi would definitely need her daddy’s money for this jaunt." (Rich leeches are evil, too.) About Penny, "even Penny, who seemed to have a burgeoning persecution complex and would often complain to me that other students in the class were out to get her. Apparently I could befriend someone with a mental disorder, but not a social climber." (This one's straightforward: women are crazy. With a bonus slam against Mimi: she's not just a rich leech, she's a social climbing rich leech!)
And, see, it doesn't help that you are yourself a woman. Women trying to put one another down to look good to the dudes is not an admirable trait; it's not a good excuse for misogyny. And when you say, "I was lucky to be working with a bunch of guys. There were none of the tense social niceties to be performed with them, which would have been totally lost on them, anyway. We were all out for the same thing—graduating first in the class—but with the guys there was no pretense, no need to cloak ambition behind politely bitchy conversation," I think, "Well, geez, given that you scornfully dismissed each of the women upon first meeting them, no wonder they're not acting sweet and forthright to you! You kinda brought that on your head."
And when you get to the story where Chef Cyndee calls you out (because you were genuinely in the wrong, I might add), I go, "Woohoo! Go Cyndee!" When you get to the story about how Mimi decided not to spend her own money taking you to dinner (because you hate her! duh!), instead of being outraged at the exclusion as you are, I say, "Thank god poor Mimi didn't feel obliged to bring someone who scorned and insulted her."
And when I get to the umpteenth reference to Cyndee's backside, I put the book down, because nobody needs that. I don't care how good the recipes are.
No love,
C
who can't help but wonder what descriptive terms she would have garnered if she had known you
and
who didn't even get into the way your rampant Francophilia bordered on xenophobia about other cultures
(The book is Under the Table: Saucy Tales from Culinary School, and I did not finish it. I also do not recommend it. If you're interested in the topic, I'd recommend instead The Sharper Your Knife, The Less You Cry or Julia Child's My Life In France.)
I'm having a fabulous honeymoon, book notwisthstanding. And now I'm switching back to Mercedes Lackey for my reading material of choice.
When the men you work with are all painted in glowing colors—even the chef who deliberately smushed salmon egg pate all over your face for fun, the fellow-student who poked you in the ass with a trussing needle, and the fellow student who sexually harasses you all the time—but all the women are described as catty, grasping, and evil, I begin to suspect that it is you, and not every other woman on earth, who has the problem.
When I notice that all of your insults of the women are gendered in ugly ways ("harpy," "witch," "lewd giggle," "middle-aged biddy," "bitch," "she tried too hard," "bleat"), or are insults of their appearance ("piercing laughter that shook her plump frame and caused her significant backside to sway like a cow having an epileptic seizure," "distinctly less than gorgeous, with her flaccid lips, protuberant eyes, and mud-colored irises, to say nothing of the truly enormous contours of her lower half—her ass was a cautionary tale of what could happen to someone who spent all their time in the kitchen," "Mimi looked pretty good for her age, but it was definitely a case of mutton dressed as lamb, as my mother would have said," "her pug nose almost twitching with anticipation") — when I notice that, my tendency to believe that they are the problem goes down another sizeable notch.
Oh, but it's okay, because you know why all these woman are so hateful. About Chef Cyndee, "I blamed it on Tucker’s super-nerd habit of asking Cyndee endless questions about the food, the recipes, the curriculum, and kitchen lore in general, none of which she knew the answers to, and Tucker blamed me for being blond and for smiling too much. I think we were both right." (Stupidity and jealousy makes women evil.) About Mimi, the Middle Eastern fellow student, "Mimi would definitely need her daddy’s money for this jaunt." (Rich leeches are evil, too.) About Penny, "even Penny, who seemed to have a burgeoning persecution complex and would often complain to me that other students in the class were out to get her. Apparently I could befriend someone with a mental disorder, but not a social climber." (This one's straightforward: women are crazy. With a bonus slam against Mimi: she's not just a rich leech, she's a social climbing rich leech!)
And, see, it doesn't help that you are yourself a woman. Women trying to put one another down to look good to the dudes is not an admirable trait; it's not a good excuse for misogyny. And when you say, "I was lucky to be working with a bunch of guys. There were none of the tense social niceties to be performed with them, which would have been totally lost on them, anyway. We were all out for the same thing—graduating first in the class—but with the guys there was no pretense, no need to cloak ambition behind politely bitchy conversation," I think, "Well, geez, given that you scornfully dismissed each of the women upon first meeting them, no wonder they're not acting sweet and forthright to you! You kinda brought that on your head."
And when you get to the story where Chef Cyndee calls you out (because you were genuinely in the wrong, I might add), I go, "Woohoo! Go Cyndee!" When you get to the story about how Mimi decided not to spend her own money taking you to dinner (because you hate her! duh!), instead of being outraged at the exclusion as you are, I say, "Thank god poor Mimi didn't feel obliged to bring someone who scorned and insulted her."
And when I get to the umpteenth reference to Cyndee's backside, I put the book down, because nobody needs that. I don't care how good the recipes are.
No love,
C
who can't help but wonder what descriptive terms she would have garnered if she had known you
and
who didn't even get into the way your rampant Francophilia bordered on xenophobia about other cultures
(The book is Under the Table: Saucy Tales from Culinary School, and I did not finish it. I also do not recommend it. If you're interested in the topic, I'd recommend instead The Sharper Your Knife, The Less You Cry or Julia Child's My Life In France.)
I'm having a fabulous honeymoon, book notwisthstanding. And now I'm switching back to Mercedes Lackey for my reading material of choice.
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no subject
Date: 2010-09-12 05:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-12 05:24 pm (UTC)And there's so little about the actual cooking.
Blech. Bad book. Boring book, livened only by hints of rage-inducing misogyny.
(There was also a bit where she explained that the actual Chinese open-air market in New York was disgusting... and then a couple of pages later raved about the Chinese food cooked by... a Frenchman, of course. There wasn't quite enough of that kind of thing to center a post around, but it left a bad taste in my mouth too.)
no subject
Date: 2010-09-12 05:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-12 05:29 pm (UTC)a book I did not finish
Date: 2010-09-12 07:53 pm (UTC)Re: a book I did not finish
Date: 2010-09-12 10:25 pm (UTC)I always want to say: if you (hypothetical you) can't get along with any other women, Occam's Razor suggests that the problem is not every other woman in the world.
Re: a book I did not finish
Date: 2010-09-13 01:28 pm (UTC)This! Very much this!
Re: a book I did not finish
Date: 2010-09-13 01:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-13 01:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-13 01:50 am (UTC)It's funny, the author managed to make me feel overwhelmingly sympathetic to everyone but her.... Which I somehow doubt was the goal!