Customer Reviews

Susie Bright's Sexual State of the Union

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This thought provoking and sometimes shocking book came highly recommended and I pass on the same sentiments. Though always interested in expanding my consciousness, I was little prepared for the giant leap I would take with each page. Susie Bright speaks intelligently from personal experience about such topics as pornography, gender, and sexuality. She provides the reader with radical yet believable interpretations that make you want to go out and explore for yourself. She brings together the human experience to which we are born, with the secret desires and fantasies we all possess, slowly unveiling the masks we hide behind. A must read if you are ready to explore your own sexual identity and biases.

This book was interesting, provocative, in some places well-researched and in some places utterly fluffy. Don't get me wrong. I Love Susie Bright. I just felt like it needed more editing to make it a more cohesive piece.

But the writing is excellent, and what could possibly be more interesting as subject matter? It was fun, and her conversation with a trans friend will certainly shake up a few readers (I couldn't decide if she was being insightful or wildly insensitive).

Recommended further reading: For a solid, well-researched history of sex in America this century, read Heidenry's "What Wild Ecstasy: The Rise and Fall of the Sexual Revolution". For utter provocative gall, amazing insight and some very surprising facts, read Levine's "Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children From Sex". Both of these were riveting, less fluffy and better edited than "Sexual State of the Union". But they all seem to speak from the same base: a fundamental understanding of the importance of both sex and free speech in our society.

Susie Bright's, The Sexual State of the Union is an ideal combination of sexual politics, and personal experience intertwined within each other. Unlike many other books that deal with sexual politics, Bright is not trying to lecture or persuade her audience, she just tells it like it is from her eyes. Her opinions are evident and she does a good job of introducing a political topic and describing how exactly this not only had an effect on our country but also how it affected Bright and her friends personally. It differs from other personal memoirs in that she brings up wider issues that were taking place in the country throughout her life time and not always makes it personal, even though the personal segments are very entertaining to read. They are informative and give advice to the younger generation and shows that even though times are different, relationship and sexual questions are forever existent. This is the type of book that anyone can pick up and read and even if they don't agree with Susie's opinions, her stories are interesting and and lined with humor most of the time. It is evident that Bright, while a firm believer in her politics, has a great sense of humor and really enjoys reaching out to her audience and pushing them to think about topics they would not have otherwise come across. Sexuality in any form is extremely taboo in the United States and Susie uncovers reasons for this and the effects this has on different pockets of our society.

The first half of this book is an excellent and frank discussion of sexual and gendered politics in America, punctuated by the authors real life experiances. Witty and insightful, it asks the classic question: Why are Americans so sexually screwed up, and what can we do to fix it? It's also a book pointedly aimed at debunking certain right wing Christian sexual myths, and does a wonderful job of that.

However, towards the end of the book (last chapter or two) she talks about being a lesbian and friends with transexuals, it seems that she is speaking too much about her own experiances, and she isn't trying them into any broader concept. While her experiances are interesting, the title of the book is "Sexual State of the Union", so one expects a little more discourse on how her experiances relate to America on a whole.

Terrific, funny, and irreverant