Review of
Instaread Summary, Analysis & Review of Jessica
Bennett's Feminist Fight Club An Office
Survival Manual (for a Sexist Workplace)
Five out of
five stars
The best way to
open a review of the summary or even the book is to define the phrase “Feminist
Fight Club.” That is best done by quoting key takeaway two:
“A Feminist Fight Club is a group of women who meet to
support and advise each other on challenges unique to working women.”
In other words it is a support group, a phrase that
sounds far less aggressive and hostile. Yet, hardly the title of a book that
will grab your attention.
The key
takeaways contain nothing that a person that has paid attention to the problems
of sexism in the workplace has not heard or experienced before. One of the best
lines is the very first one of the first key takeaway.
“Women continue to face intentional and unintentional
workplace discrimination from both men and women.”
The point that it is both intentional and
unintentional as well as being from both men and women is an extremely important
one. It is often true that the intentional discrimination by a man grabs and
holds the headlines, yet unintentional discrimination or that subtly done by
another woman is overlooked. I have personally been told by females in my
classes (I am a college professor) that their greatest difficulties at work
were with other women.
The last key
takeaway is one that women often overlook:
“Men can be valuable allies for women in the workplace
if they work to give their female co-workers the credit they deserve and treat
all co-workers equally.”
I would alter this to say, “A man can be your most
valuable ally in the workplace . . .”
One interesting
point of historical fact mentioned in the summary is that the first minimum
wage law in the United States was enacted in Washington, D. C. The purpose was
to provide a minimum hourly wage for women so that they would not be exploited.
From the
“Author’s style” section it is clear that the book is written with an attitude
as can be seen in the following sentence.
“The tone throughout is confrontational and irreverent
in an apparent effort to solicit the solidarity of an assumed reader who has
been obstructed or cheated by a system that disadvantages women.”
The intended audience for the book is clearly women
with a problem of this type. Reading it will certainly help them better face
their issues and the content of the summary will convince them of that.
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