Herald & Lantern 4 May '83

47

Good Reading

A REVIEW by Owen Murphy

. Our Blood: Prophecies and Discourses on Sexual Politics * By ANDREA DWORKIN (All of the books reviewed in this column are available at the Cape May County Library.) Andrea Dworking is one of the most militant feminists in the Woman's Movement and probably the most articulate. Our Blood, published in 1976, is a collection of very angry essays by a very angry young woman. Any aware man who reads Our Blood will know exactly why, in recent years, so many good women have become militants. Dworkin is more readable than Kate Millett, more passionate than Phyliss Chesler, more profound than Robin Morgan, and more eloquent than any of her contemporaries. Her central themes seem to be these: that women in America are largely invisible, both to themselves and to men; that men bond together out of fear of each other, and socialize their own agressive instincts in the common erotic project of keeping women down; that masculinity is the only signet of worth in our society. and that all of women's efforts in the Arts have been judged trivial because women are considered trivial; that all of recorded history has been his-story and that we are about to enter the age of her-story. OUR BLOOD contains fascinating sections on the history of witchcraft (9,000,000 women executed during a 300-year period), Chinese footbinding (the horror that Spring Moon only hinted at), the treatment of women slaves and indentured servants through! 1865, and a world history of licensed and approved rape (from Deuteronomy in the Old Testament to Gangla Desh in modern times). If Andrea Dworkin has her way,' then male domination of society will be obliterated from the face of the earth. She wants to sec all men and women work toward ending those forms of social injustice which she feels spring from the patriarchal model of male dominance — imperialism, colonialism, racism, war, poverty; and violence in every form. All of the following quotations are by the author, Andrea Dworkin. There are two definitions of woman. There is the good woman. She is a victim. There is the bad woman. She must be destroyed. The good woman must be possessed. The bad woman must be killed or punished Both must be nullified. Many women, I think, resist feminism because it is an agony to be fully conscious of the brutal misogyny which permeates culture, society, and all personal relationships. It is as if our oppression were cast in lava eons ago and now it is granite, and each individual woman is buried inside the stone. Women try to survive inside the stone, buried in it. Women say "I like this stone; its weight is not too heavy for me.” Women defend the stone by saying that it pro-

tects them from rain and wind and fire. Women say, "All I have ever known is this stone, what is there without it?" In masculinist terms, a woman can never be raped against tier will since the notion is that if she does not want to be raped, she does not know her will. When one's identity is defined as a lack of indentity, when one’s survival is contingent on learning to destroy or restrain every impulse toward selfdefinition, when one is consistently and exclusively rewarded for hurting oneself by conforming to demeaning or degrading rules of behaviour, when one is consistenly and inevitably punished for accomplishing or succeeding or asserting, when one is battered and rammed, physically and/or emotionally for any act or thought of rebellion, and then applauded and approved for giving in, recanting, apologizing, then masochism — the dynamic of fear — docs indeed become the cornerstone of one’s personality. Women have been taught that for us, the world is flat, and that if we venture out. we will fall of the edge In fact, men own the sex act, the language which describes sex, the women whom they objectify Men have written the scenario for any sexual fantasy you have ever had or any sexual act you have ever engaged in.

Rx

by Or Robert G Beil nun

It's time for a confession I’ve slipped and haven’t been following my own advice on dieting. The slips haven’t been all that major. Yesterday, four chocolates offered by a patient from candy brought in by her friends. A chocolate cream doughnut at one of the nurses’ stations the day before. Four rolls and butter while waiting for the main course at a continu ing education dinner.

Little slips: unfortunately, they equal about 200 calories or more a day Two-hundred calories a day, times 30 days, equals 6,000 calories ‘a month, which is about one and a half pounds of weight That comes to 18 extra pounds over the course of a year! Some of that was compcn sated for by working out at the gym Unfortunately I've gotten out of the habit of going to the gym and

Lookin' and Listenin' Before the Canal?

By DOROTHY I). FREAS Listening to a young man talking to us about this area, and hearing him say that it is so beautiful — the seashore, ocean, bay plus the country, with back roads and farms — we agreed with every word. At one point in the conversation, the phrase ‘‘before the canal was here” brought a surprised look from him That was before his coming — not only to Cape May, but into the world! v His question, "When was that dug?" took us back to the days of the second World War. As U.S. ships went out from Delaware Bay into the Atlantic Ocean off the tip of Cape May, they were in great danger from enemy submarines. The solution was an inland waterway The plan was made to begin dredging at New England Creek, and to cut across the cape from the bay to Cape May Harbor THUS IN JULY of 1942, dredging started by widening and deepening the creek. Within four and a half months, the canal was ready to protect our tankers. Some of the roads that we had used now ended at the canal, and a new bridge later carried Old Seashore Road across the new canal It was built with quite an upward incline, and has found some use in testing »he power of a car to go uphill without noises it should nbt have. Not many hills in this county! The spoil-banks along the sides of the canal provided a good hunting-ground for a quantity of interesting fossil shells dating from the time that the ocean had covered what is now Cape May How one short questior^stirs a long memory

County Library by Kathleen Duffy

I know that the definition of "Mom" is jack of all trades. I know that the lawn needs fertilizing, the kitchen floor needs waxing and it's time to face up to spring cleaning. I know your 4-year-old has clogged the toilet with play-doh. your April bank statement has just arrived and you haven't had time to reconcile the January statement. I also know you don't want to miss Phil Donahue because he’s going to be interviewing a person with a lurid personal history, and the dog doesn’t seem to understand about using the newspapers I know all about that stuff Cleaning, cooking, laundry, waxing, walking, watching, and unclogging. ENOUGHT! Hang up the phone, pull the plug on the coffee pot, tie the dog up in the yard, put the dirty clothes in the closet, put an "out of order” sign on the toilet, file away the bank statement, and leave the fertilizer in the garage. Grab your kid, say goodbye to Mister Rogers, get in the car and drive down to the library early enought to find a convenient parking space. Officially you're coming to the library so your child can participate in the library’s pre-school storyhour program But secretly you're doing it for yourself. FOR 45 MINUTES you

can liberate yourself from the heartbreak of ring around the collar, spots on your dishes, the trauma of static cling, and the embarrassment of dirty wax buildup. For 45 minutes you can browse through the library’s large collection pf new books, pick out a fram ed art print for your walls, read the morning newspaper, or thumb through more than 400 magazine titles Or you can just sit and enjoy the quiet without the fear of buzzers to summon you, phones to distract you, or doorbells to assault your ears. For 45 minutes your child will be under the care and responsibility or a children's librarian who will read to him, sometimes teach a craft or a song. For too long libraries have been promoting story hours for the sake of the children and it hasn't always been effective because Moms always have floors, bank statements and Phil Donahue. So Moms think about it again. Don't do your kid a favor. Do yourself a favor If you live in the lower part of the county, drive over to our new Lower Cape Branch on Tuesday morning at 10:30 In the Avalon, Stone Harbor area drive over to the Avalon Branch for Friday morning storyhours at 10:30 a m. In Wildwood the storyhours

are held at the Wildwood Recreation Center in North Wildwood Tuesday mornings at 10 a m The Main library holds its storyhour Thursday mornings at 10:30. There are no fees, no registration and ho excuses lot to treat yourself t

whammo I’m over the weight most comfortable for me. DIETERS have many choices to make in selecting a weight loss program The broad categories are: diet, drugs, surgery, psychology, and exercise I fundamentally disapprove of drug therepy for weight loss Many of the drugs are addicting Even those,, that are not physically addic ting may have side effects, plus once one stops taking the drugs, the old habits generally return Let's skip drugs and look to more natural methods SURGERY Should be considered only in cases of "morbid obesity." This means you are 200 percent or more of your desirable weight, have had no response to medical therapy, and have lifethreatening consequences as a result of being overweight. There are many risks associated with the currently available surgical approaches, so I believe they should be con sidered only as a last resort. There is not much evidence that "going into therapy" helps people lose weight However, for many it is helpful to try behavioral change (which is what dieting is), in the company of others DIET CLUBS can help us have the necessary "spirit" and conviction to stick with our weight control program In fact, our eating "idiosyncracies" (habits) may have preferences we dort’t even notice that are adding hidden calories. An effective way to detect this is to keep a written record of everything we cat for a week and the circumstances when we ate. This may help pinpoint "unnecessary" or "extra" foods or eating times YOUR FAMILY doctor will be able to help you determine the proper range of weight and calorie intake for your sex, age and build. You can add up your daily calorie intake and compare it with the doctor's recommendation to determine whether a

weight control program should be considered. Exercise is a way of using up calories. If your family, physician feels'you can toferate it. the effect of your diet will be improved by added exercise. DIETING, with actual changes in food intake, is the cornerstone of weight loss There are numerous types of diets It is* impor tant to realize that publish ed diets are not necessarily safe or effective Diets must be carefully evaluated as to their nutri tional impact Many of the "fad" diets arc flawed in this way and I recommend that they be avoided. Fasting is another com mon technique Some pro pie will fast a few days out of the week, some weeks at a time Where medically necessary, hospitalsupervised fasting can be done. HOWEVER, the risks of fasting on your own are great. Associated problems, include liver dysfunction, infection, heart trouble, dehydration, personality changes, and in long fasts, the physical problems associated with starvation. In the first three weeks most weight loss is water When eating resumes that weight comes right back Another problem with fasting is that the person has not developed a new eating lifestyle to keep the weight off. I do not recommend fasLs at any time for any patients. Next week Some of the fad diets, and what's wrong with them.

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