Against Our Will: Men, Women and RapeSusan Brownmiller’s groundbreaking bestseller uncovers the culture of violence against women with a devastating exploration of the history of rape—now with a new preface by the author exposing the undercurrents of rape still present today Rape, as author Susan Brownmiller proves in her startling and important book, is not about sex but about power, fear, and subjugation. For thousands of years, it has been viewed as an acceptable “spoil of war,” used as a weapon by invading armies to crush the will of the conquered. The act of rape against women has long been cloaked in lies and false justifications. It is ignored, tolerated, even encouraged by governments and military leaders, misunderstood by police and security organizations, freely employed by domineering husbands and lovers, downplayed by medical and legal professionals more inclined to “blame the victim,” and, perhaps most shockingly, accepted in supposedly civilized societies worldwide, including the United States. Against Our Will is a classic work that has been widely credited with changing prevailing attitudes about violence against women by awakening the public to the true and continuing tragedy of rape around the globe and throughout the ages. Selected by the New York Times Book Review as an Outstanding Book of the Year and included among the New York Public Library’s Books of the Century, Against Our Will remains an essential work of sociological and historical importance. |
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LibraryThing Review
User Review - Angelic55blonde - LibraryThingIt is easy to see why this is a classic. It was originally written in the late 1960s/early 1970s and was, at the time, a groundbreaking book on the subject of rape. The author clearly was a feminist ... Read full review
LibraryThing Review
User Review - tole_lege - LibraryThingVery old now, the original book dates form the 1970s, iirc - but it is still worth reading for some of the different perceptions of rape, which, most unfortunately, don't seem to have changed. Read full review
Contents
World War II | |
Riots Pogroms and Revolutions | |
A Question of Race | |
Institution and Authority | |
The Myth of the Heroic Rapist | |
The Setting | |
The Crime | |
Women Fight Back | |
About the Author | |
The | |
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