Customer Reviews

When She Was Bad...: Violent Women and the Myth of Innocence

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a wonderful bit of pop sociology that only a woman could write. If a man dare say what Pearson says here, the feminists would hang him by his word processor. But journalist Pearson, who has a super-fine feel for the politically correct, steers her way through the granite rocks by flatly stating that women are just as violent as men while slyly suggesting that if some people don't think that women have the same capacity for violence, maybe they are buying the "weaker sex" mythology and by extension continuing the subjugation. Let me tell you, this hits home with the Ms. crowd big time. Pearson paints a picture of women and violence that would give Charlie Manson pause, and you get the sense that she has the feminists soberly nodding their heads, "this is true, this is true." Susan Brownmiller, author of Against Our Will, and bona fide feminist icon, even contributes a blurb for Pearson's book, allowing that there was "much to agree...and disagree with," but registers her approval with "...my tilt was definitely in her favor."

Mine too. I was actually surprised at the stats Pearson quotes showing the extent of feminine violence. Men too get beaten up (although let's be clear about this, not nearly as often). What I like best about the book is the hope that it is the beginning of an understanding that violence is a human sickness, not confined to one sex, and that psychological violence can be as brutal as physical. The violent evils that women are statistically more capable of-infanticide, crimes against the elderly, the murder of children, etc.-are starkly documented here. The real horror though, that women actually create the violent psychopaths through sexual choice, is a truth that even Pearson is not capable of addressing-yet. It's coming, though. When it is realized that the women who "can't help themselves" when they choose to mate with violent psychopaths in preference to milquetoasts (to use a word Pearson employs) also share responsibility for the violence in human society, then we will have made real progress toward ending the violence.

The chapters on women as predators, and women as partners in violent crime, and especially the chapter on women in prison make the book. I always wondered why the prison system couldn't keep the drugs out. This book has the answer: the prison authorities want the drugs in as a means of helping them control the prisoners. Pearson points out that pacifying drugs, like heroin and hashish, are easy to get; non-pacifying drugs like cocaine are not so easy to get. Pearson also makes it clear that violence is, as I said above, a human problem, not confined to one sex; indeed this is her point and a reason for exposing all the female violence that we as a society tend to forget and to downplay. Pearson wants to make sure we don't forget.

As I read this book I was reminded of why I seldom read feminist writers or listen to macho AM talk shows: the hard core sexists in their pathological need to hate the opposite sex are so dishonest and so prejudiced that what they say has no informational meaning. Pearson exposes this mentality again and again, sometimes by quoting feminine authors in vacuous support of some female murderess as "courageous" or as someone "justifiably" bent on "righteous" rage.

Some (now) purely political words that feminists might want to lose (it occurred to me as I was reading this book): "courage" as in "the courage to heal"; "empowerment," as in shooting her husband was "a liberating act of empowerment" (we all want to be empowered); and especially "liberating." What we need to get liberated from is the nature of sexuality itself, from identifying ourselves, as most people do, primarily as sexual creatures. Sex is the instrument of the evolutionary process, the tool of creatures who eat and are eaten. It was here long before we evolved and it will be here long after we are gone. While reading Pearson's vivid glimpses of women in prison, I was struck by how demoralizing it is to see people with nothing better to do than parade their sexuality, whatever the nature of that sexuality. But worse yet is people like feminist Jane Caputi (quoted in Pearson's book as saying that serial killers act on behalf of all men as henchmen in the subordination of women) who identify themselves primarily in terms of sex, saying they are feminists. Pathetic. I should be a "masculinist" or whatever the male equivalent is. When I was twenty I identified with myself as a "man." I didn't think how much better it would be to identify with myself as a human being. But I was twenty. What's the feminist excuse?

Pearson, an award-winning journalist, presents contemporary social science research that belies the cultural myths of female powerlessness and innocence - blinders society must remove for women to be understood as inherently equal and human, with all the freedoms and responsibilities this entails. The continued myth of feminine mystique and innocence must give way to a recognition of common humanity, with all of our fatal flaws and saving graces. As a counseling psychologist, I welcome the honesty and mutual understanding of which this book and other efforts are social harbingers.

Patricia Pearson has a gift for bringing to light the mystique of the female murderer. She is an intriguing writer and has brought insight into a very real and difficult topic. When kids in schools kill--everyone assumes that only boys do this kind of mayhem. No one cares that Brenda Spencer or Laurie Denn both shot elementary students up in 1979 and 1988 respectively, or that in 1995, in two separate incidents, two girls stabbed a classmate to death at school. Of course not, girls do not harm others. Pearson shows us in her work that we are masters of denial when it comes to women and violence.

I found Pearson's book to be one of the most engaging arguments I have ever studied. She speaks of a human truth that has long been hidden under our society's ideals. Her argument is intelligent, insightful, inspiring, and complete; she has voiced what I have always felt to be true and yet never had the words to explain or the research to support. I applaud Patricia Pearson for a book that made me look at myself and the rest of society in an entirely refreshing new light!

An exceptionally well written book on a topic that gets too little attention. The author discusses the various manners in which women exhibit violent behaviour, and how society has come to view violent women differently than violent men. Violence is for the most part a learned trait, one that, while in most cases not as destructive as is the case with men, women are equally capable of resorting to. This book is definitely not an anti-woman tract, but is simply a statement of undeniable fact.

I just completed an honors level independent study using this text. Well written, excellent bibliography and impactful content.

This is a very good collection of facts to have on hand. It makes for good reading too. Pearson's main point is that crime won't be well understood until the myth of female innocence is depotentiated. Excellent chapters on female criminality including women who give birth and then kill, women who kill their children later, women who kill family members, nurses who kill, predatory women, women who batter their (male or female) mates, female serial killers, and so on. Excellent accounts of how women use their femininity to avoid prosecution, or to become the preferred perpetrator, who gets first shot at copping for a lesser charge.

There is a later edition of this book with the subtitle: How women get away with murder, or something close to that. I have no idea how different the two books are.

This is an excellent book, well researched and well written by a 3rd Wave feminist journalist. While Kirkus Reviews calls it "frightening", it is more of a myth breaker, showing how, despite rhetoric to the contrary, women are truly equal to men in their violence and criminality. The sections on female sexual offenders and on husband batterers are especially telling.

Hi.. I am posting this review to point out that there is another book by the same author, which appears to me to contain a great deal of overlapping material with this book but is titled WHEN SHE WAS BAD: How Women Get Away With Murder. It seems, from a glance, that the latter is a reformulation of this earlier book. Both are available here at Amazon. This book, however, stirred up a little controversy in Crime writing communities when it appeared because of it's failure to adequately point out that the types of violence committed by women, and that result in murder, are produced by vastly different motivations than those committed by men. While this book does a great job of shocking the reader into admitting that Women can be as brutal as men, I just don't feel it takes into account all the great work being done by those former FBI guys John Douglas and Robert Ressler that points to an overwhelming sexual motive for Male multiple homicides which we commonly call Serial Killing. This sexual compulsion motivation just does not appear as commonly in female Homicide. Thus, taking the FBI to task, for not recognizing women as killers is kinda silly since they rarely have the jurisdiction to deal with the majority of female killers. This book equates the female types of Multiple Homicides (Angel of Mercy deaths for example) with "Serial Killing" not seeming to notice that this term has been traditionally applied to only certain types of Murder. To the authors' and editor's credit they got me thinking about whether or not we need a NEW Term for Multiple Homicide.

Since there are not many books that deal exlcusively with Homicidal Women, this is one for the reference shelf. However, I intend to check out the other book I mentioned in my first line to see if the author corrected some of the oversights in this edition and if she expounded upon some of the areas she touched on here. If this stuff fascinates you, Michael Newton has a book on the subject too but it pretty much just catalogs the Female murderers. Even so, a listing like that can be useful since reading it cover to cover will indirectly tell you all you need to know about the types of Murders women commit. He has many titles and I am sure Amazon has it.

This book addresses the pitfalls in adopting and maintaining social policies which identify social pathology and violent behavior exclusively with men. It questions the premise that the most dangerous elements of society are by nature men. It posits that the most dangerous criminals regardless of gender may be those who can best manipulate society from a position of trust and confidence with the appearance of harmlessness.

The author exposes the myth that females are by nature the nurturing sex and largely incapable of horrendous criminal behavior. She explains that it is this cover which allows them to operate under the radar, manipulate social stereotypes and inflict murder and mayhem upon their unsuspecting victims. Then, because their crimes are perpetuated with the complicity of a negligent community, these criminals are less likely to be identified by the same myopic social institutions responsible for supplying the victims in the first place.

Female predators do exist. Although their methods are different, their results are no less catastrophic to their victims. Domestic violence, despite what some pundits would want us all to believe has no gender-based victim. Victims are both male and female. But guys should not bother looking for agencies or shelter from the injuries inflicted upon them by their female mates...there are none. Getting the truth out about domestic violence would ruin the foundation upon which the industry is built. The public sentiment and the profits would stop flowing.

For all the gentlemen (especially fathers) that are victims of an emotionally and financially abusive system that refuses to recognize your grievances, this book is for you. You are not paranoid. Your ex, the judges and attorneys really are out to get you (or at least your wages) and like Bloodhounds, the feminist predators are plotting the course.