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Good Guys, Bad Guys and Other Lovers: Every Woman's Guide to Relationships
196 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1989
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
October 1, 2014
When I started to read it my first thought was: THIS IS AMAZING! This is one of those books that makes you think about everything in your life. I felt so connected and identified with most of the stories and the way that these authors explain everything. This book belongs to my mom and it's from the 90s but I think it's timeless.
I find some of my thoughts written in this book, everytime I read something I said "OMG. I always tell that to my friends or I think the same way". It's good to find a book like that.
This is the book that every woman should read.
I find some of my thoughts written in this book, everytime I read something I said "OMG. I always tell that to my friends or I think the same way". It's good to find a book like that.
This is the book that every woman should read.
July 1, 2018
At last I have read Shere Hite's book, many years after buying it and letting it gather dust on my bookshelf, convinced that this is a women’s book and not for me, really. And lo and behold: the seven chapters of ‘Good guys…’ almost exclusively discuss women’s relationships with men. Only in the last chapter relationships between women (also lesbian) are touched upon.
The text largely consists of quotes and testimonies from a great number of women (a bit like in the ‘agony aunt’-pages of a women’s magazine, I guess) and Shere Hite, though a university graduate ‘cum laude’, disappointingly limits herself to introducing these quotes and commenting on them. Not much of a scientific analysis, if any at all. Words like feel, feeling, emotion, emotional, hurt, understanding, support, crying, communication, anger, sadness etc. etc. are spread lavishly all over the text, so that ‘Good guys…’, far from being a sociological treatise, rather is a touchy-feely book by a woman for women.
The main ‘thesis’ of the book seems to be frustration. Women continually want to communicate with their partner, discuss their relationship, express their feelings, utter their grievances when there is conflict, give vent to their resentment when something goes wrong, etc. Men, on the other hand, profoundly dislike such emotional confrontations. They avoid or ignore them, or accuse their partners of being emotional, childish, neurotic, crazy etc. No wonder women feel ignored, frustrated, belittled, humiliated and even effectively made a victim to ‘emotional violence’ (sic). Hence this book is strictly female territory where women can recognize common experiences, a refuge where they can huddle together for understanding, support and soothing of their emotional wounds. Consequently there is not one quote or testimony from a man (alpha or other), that desirable yet terribly frustrating significant other. Of course there are also a number of testimonies of emotional happiness and sexual gratification. Yet the general purpose of the book is explicitly expressed at the end: women should unite, show solidarity with all the members of their sex and press collectively and proactively for equality in relationships with men and in society at large.
Today ‘Good guys…’ seems a bit dated. In modern society gender equality is largely a fact, with many women occupying positions of power and responsibility. On a personal level the recent and worldwide ‘Me too’-movement’ appears to be a milestone in the fight for respect and equality in relationships.
Yet much in this book still rings true 29 years after its publication, if not in the facts, at least in the general tone. The reason is self-evident. In his address to the Oxford Union (June 24th 2018) the Canadian clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson dwelled upon the topic and stated: “We saw (sic) cross-culturally whether there were differences in the fundamental temperaments of men and women and the answer was ‘yes’, cross-culturally. (…) As you flatten out the socio-cultural landscape men and women become (not the same but) more different.”
In other words, no matter how much you try to create gender equality in society, women are and will always be fundamentally different in nature, proclivities, sensitivity, emotionality, etc… In short: there is no denying the perennial ‘das ewich Weibliche’ (Faust, Goethe). That is blatantly obvious in Hire’s book, and it remains so in today’s life. And why should we deny it? Upon this I rest my case.
The text largely consists of quotes and testimonies from a great number of women (a bit like in the ‘agony aunt’-pages of a women’s magazine, I guess) and Shere Hite, though a university graduate ‘cum laude’, disappointingly limits herself to introducing these quotes and commenting on them. Not much of a scientific analysis, if any at all. Words like feel, feeling, emotion, emotional, hurt, understanding, support, crying, communication, anger, sadness etc. etc. are spread lavishly all over the text, so that ‘Good guys…’, far from being a sociological treatise, rather is a touchy-feely book by a woman for women.
The main ‘thesis’ of the book seems to be frustration. Women continually want to communicate with their partner, discuss their relationship, express their feelings, utter their grievances when there is conflict, give vent to their resentment when something goes wrong, etc. Men, on the other hand, profoundly dislike such emotional confrontations. They avoid or ignore them, or accuse their partners of being emotional, childish, neurotic, crazy etc. No wonder women feel ignored, frustrated, belittled, humiliated and even effectively made a victim to ‘emotional violence’ (sic). Hence this book is strictly female territory where women can recognize common experiences, a refuge where they can huddle together for understanding, support and soothing of their emotional wounds. Consequently there is not one quote or testimony from a man (alpha or other), that desirable yet terribly frustrating significant other. Of course there are also a number of testimonies of emotional happiness and sexual gratification. Yet the general purpose of the book is explicitly expressed at the end: women should unite, show solidarity with all the members of their sex and press collectively and proactively for equality in relationships with men and in society at large.
Today ‘Good guys…’ seems a bit dated. In modern society gender equality is largely a fact, with many women occupying positions of power and responsibility. On a personal level the recent and worldwide ‘Me too’-movement’ appears to be a milestone in the fight for respect and equality in relationships.
Yet much in this book still rings true 29 years after its publication, if not in the facts, at least in the general tone. The reason is self-evident. In his address to the Oxford Union (June 24th 2018) the Canadian clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson dwelled upon the topic and stated: “We saw (sic) cross-culturally whether there were differences in the fundamental temperaments of men and women and the answer was ‘yes’, cross-culturally. (…) As you flatten out the socio-cultural landscape men and women become (not the same but) more different.”
In other words, no matter how much you try to create gender equality in society, women are and will always be fundamentally different in nature, proclivities, sensitivity, emotionality, etc… In short: there is no denying the perennial ‘das ewich Weibliche’ (Faust, Goethe). That is blatantly obvious in Hire’s book, and it remains so in today’s life. And why should we deny it? Upon this I rest my case.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews