Book Review

The Women's Freedom Network Newsletter January/February, 2000, Vol. 7, Number 1. Cease Fire!: Off and On Target, But Not Always Sticking to Its Guns Ceasefire: Why Women and Men Must Join Forces to Achieve True Equality (The Free Press, February 1999) by Cathy Young Reviewed by Bruce Kanter

H aving just completed Cathy Young's book Cease Fire! I feel it is in some ways a landmark book. Much of her critique of radical feminism, as well as her analysis of conservative opposition to changing sex roles, is among the best to date. Her analysis of the "Men's Rights Movement" also raises a number of legitimate points. However, her book is not without some of the same types of flaws that she observes in the groups she critiques.

A good example of this is her analysis of Warren Farrell's book The Myth of Male Power. While she makes some valid points, she also seems to take liberty with what Farrell actually said. Take, for example, her discussion of the one million men killed or maimed in the World War I "Battle of the Somme." Farrell's point in this part of the book (28-30), is that if any group other than men was singled out by the draft and custom and suffered such destruction, a holocaust would be an apt description. Indeed it is hard to argue if any group, (Farrell, 28) "be that group blacks, Jews, women, or gays" were singled out exclusively to serve and die in war, this would be condemned as a particularly horrendous example of discrimination.

Ms. Young quotes Farrell (Young, 240) discussing the Battle of the Somme saying "instead of calling it a holocaust we call it serving the country." Young then goes on to say that World War I was hardly seen as glorious. Certainly she is right that the mass death in war is generally seen as tragic. However, one wonders what that has to do with Farrell's point. What she is referring to is his use of the word "glory" earlier in the paragraph. Farrell says "we don't call male-killing sexism, we call it glory." (29) This seems to me to be an accurate statement since war-heroes are given metals and statues are made commemorating their actions. However, Young manages to completely avoid Farrell's point--that if such destruction occurred to any other category of people besides men, the word holocaust would be an apt description.

A second point to consider, on page 237, Young quotes Farrell saying circumcision is "violence against an infant boy" and she goes on to say that Farrell finds it "comparable to clitoridectomy in the Third World." Farrell's argument is that circumcision is medically unnecessary. Certainly, by that criteria, it qualifies as child abuse and on that standard even an affliction of unnecessary minor pain to a baby would be considered child abuse. Farrell's claim equating circumcision in the United States with clitorectomies, lends credence to Young's claim that "many masculinist grievances are a muddled mix of truth and melodramatic exaggeration." (Young, 237). In the footnotes however, (343) Young points out that he is referring to the removal of the clitoral hood only, and she observes that clitorectomy "usually involves the removal of the entire clitoris." This makes Farrell's contention more plausible but suggests either lack of knowledge or deception on his part. However, when I examined the pages cited (221 to 223) this is not what I found. First, the word "clitorectomy" was never used. Farrell cites an acknowledged expert who says that "almost every reason used for circumcision could be used to justify removing a girls clitoral hood." He then goes on to point out that when the clitoral hood is removed in some African tribes we consider it to be barbaric (223). Yet, as he explained, circumcision, America's "most common surgical procedure," draws far less criticism in the U.S.A. than a similar procedure in Africa (221).

Her critique of Farrell's portrayal of men as the suicide sex also has some problems. Are the higher rates of male (successful) suicide, and the recent widening of the gap between the genders in suicide a result of male powerlessness and stricter sex roles? Ms. Young points out that whites commit suicide more frequently than blacks, and that the gender suicide gap was even higher in the 1920's. Certainly these are two valid points. However, Farrell addresses both that the most suicide is committed by whites, (172) and that the gender-suicide gap used to be much higher (164).

One can certainly question how accurate Farrell's reasons for the higher male suicide rate are. However, some of Young 's observations do not concur with views she expressed earlier in the book. For instance, her views on gender differences involving sexuality are that they're greater than any other area, but that while gender differences probably exist, they are exaggerated. She points out that even extreme gender differences, such as the study of college students discussed on page 31, are subject to cultural differences. She also concedes that differences "in this area of human behavior, evolutionary logic makes the most sense." (31)

However, the gender differences in suicide rates are comparable to those regarding sexuality. Young does say that "male unemployment is far more likely to lead to suicide" (Young 238). However, this explanation is inadequate to account for the large differences in suicide rates. Farrell relates the high suicide rates of men in the 1930's to the depression; Young cites the 1920's. However, male unemployment can't account for the six-times greater suicide rate in this period (Young, 238). Why do boys' suicide rates go from being slightly less than girls, to four times as great at adolescence (Farrell, 165)? Unemployment cannot be the reason.

Young calls 30% in gender difference a dramatic gap (26). Compare that with the suicide gap. The four times as many male suicides of course, could also be called a 60% difference. Some of the other differences are more extreme. Young observes that "a white man aged seventy-five to eighty-four is nearly ten times more likely" to commit suicide than a white woman (221). Farrell says elderly men are 14.5 times more likely to commit suicide (175). Both of these statistics show an over 80% gender differences in suicide rates.

While some of the difference indeed may be biological, it would be difficult to attribute this major difference in elderly suicide to evolutionary biology. Men over 70 sometimes conceive children, while women of that age are incapable of doing so without artificial means. Also the increase in suicide disparities occur at a time when the sexes have become more biologically similar.