Customer Reviews

The Pleasure Principle: Sex, Backlash, and the Struggle for Gay Freedom

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The current search by physicicists for a "Theory Of Everything", a short formula that will explain the universe.... comes to mind when reading Michael Bronski's newest and best book.Bronski shows that several aspects of lesbians & gay mens' lives, usually treated as separate subjects (sexuality, psychology, social norms & biasas, discrimination & civil rights) actually make a lot more sense--- when considered together, as a unified whole.He shows that you can't understand why lesbians & gay men are where we are, today, in terms of human rights..... unless you look at more than a little history.

Author Michael Bronski has written a great and understandable book on the homophobia that heterosexual society feels toward homosexuals. In short, all because gays experience sexual freedom and often live their sexuality freely without fear of repercussions which straight society feels would be the downfall of civilization as know it, especially if everyone adopted this paradigm of thought. This is a myth that gets explicated fully here by Bronski drawing on several examples from history and research. Bronski makes his most insightful points on the "gaze" of the male body, the continued struggles for gays due to the AIDS crisis and the difference between public and private space relating to the "gay ghetto" in straight society. Also Bronski makes a startling revelation that gay society is not assimilating to the straight ideal but that straight society is actually accepting, adopting and drawing from gay culture more. The thought that "the world is turning upside down" due to the experience of sexual pleasure is ridiculous and unfounded. As a scholar interested in media and gay studies I can't stress how important and meaningful I found this text to be. It justifiably has a place in every personal and academic library because within it this book speaks volumes of information.

Many books divide the subject of lesbian & gay male or 'queer' liberation, into isolated parts. The legal part. The sexuality part. The cultural change part.Michael Bronski's new book shows that-- that's arbitrary, and doesn't respect the historical facts.You CAN'T understand why we are so late in gaining civil rights against housing & employment discrimination in most States, and federally.... if you isolate that question from the sexual and the cultural history areas.Bronski shows, step by step, that those "soft" (he doesn't use that term) areas of gay studies-- are the things you need to understand, to explain the "hard" areas (he doesn't use that term, either) of L/B/G human rights and legal struggles .... And, to some extent, vice versa.The newly popular wave of "conservative" or quasi-closety authors, who isolate the human rights issues and avoid the realities of who we are, by saying things like "We're exactly the same as heterosexuals" ... can never explain why our situation is what it is, or how homophobia and discrimination can be dealt with ... without the wholistic approach, that Michael Bronski has now carried further, than any other gay liberationist author.

I read this book when it first came out, and was absolutely thrilled by it. I was familiar with some of Bronski's writings, but this book represents a huge practical & philosophical work in gender.

I ran across this book the other day, and began reading it again (in light of the resurgence of Fox News/Glen Beck-style homophobia of recent years). I'm finding it probably more relevant today than a decade ago.

I don't recall the entire argument, and of course as I'm re-reading it, I'm finding new insights. I remember particularly liking the chapter on "Suffer the Little Children" (about the effective use of children, by the media & right-wing politicians, as an excuse for various oppressions).

But I will disagree/depart a bit from the other reviewers - this is not a book about homophobia or gay rights. (As a straight person, I have a blanket policy of supporting equality, but would not really be interested in reading books on the subject).

Instead, Bronski asks fundamental questions about the parameters of personal freedom vs. limits of collective freedom, and the power structures which define/decide these questions. It should be clear this is relevant to us all. And Bronski demonstrates a fact that social historians have repeated for years, that all oppressions are related. So the institutional homophobia described here definitely do affect straight people as well - how we understand & define our bodies, how we relate to each other, etc.

Bronski explores not just the laws (which has changed since the writing of this book, especially Lawrence vs. Texas) ... but he also explores literature, theater, history, psychology, etc. It's a great example of a multi-disciplinary approach.

5 stars.