The Prisoner of Sex - Notes

Books by Norman Mailer

  • Lists several books by Norman Mailer, including:
    • The Prisoner of Sex
    • The Naked and the Dead
    • Barbary Shore
    • The Deer Park
    • The White Negro
    • Advertisements for Myself
    • Deaths for the Ladies (And Other Disasters)
    • The Presidential Papers
    • An American Dream
    • Cannibals and Christians
    • Why Are We in Vietnam?
    • The Deer Park - A Play
    • The Armies of the Night
    • Miami and the Siege of Chicago
    • A Fire on the Moon

The Prisoner of Sex - Germaine Greer and Female Identity

  • Germaine Greer's work is quoted, emphasizing the cultural negativity surrounding female anatomy and menstruation.
    • The quote highlights the anxiety women face regarding their bodies and the pressure to conceal natural processes.
    • "The worst name anyone can be called is cunt. The best thing a cunt can be is small and unobtrusive…"
    • Greer challenges the reader to reconsider their feelings about menstruation, suggesting self-acceptance as a step towards emancipation.
    • "If you think you are emancipated, you might consider the idea of tasting your menstrual blood-if it makes you sick, you've a long way to go, baby."

Male Conceit and Women Writing About Men

  • The author observes that women are now writing about men in a way similar to how Henry Miller wrote about women, with unflinching detail.
    • This shift challenges male conceit, which was founded on the idea that men were capable of handling harsher truths than women.
    • The author acknowledges the need to learn and adapt to these changing perspectives.

Women's Liberation - A Radical Idea

  • The core of Women's Liberation is identified as fundamentally radical, necessitating consideration.
    • The author admits a personal resistance to this radicalism but recognizes the societal issues that necessitate revolutionary thought.
    • The text suggests that without revolutionaries, society would stagnate and face ecological disaster and economic collapse.

Sympathies and Male Prejudice

  • The author admits to holding male prejudices and notes a lack of comprehension among female writers regarding the importance of male sexual experience.
    • A “firm erection on a delicate fellow" is described as the adventurous juncture of ego and courage.
    • The author criticizes the perceived assumption in Women's Lib that male sexual force is merely a matter of luck rather than a moral achievement.

Fragility of Men and Female Influence

  • The text asserts that men are relatively fragile and can be brought down by women.
    • References Hemingway's "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber" to illustrate the subtle power dynamics between men and women.
    • The author contrasts the challenges men face when dealing with attractive, dishonest women versus unattractive, angry women.

The War Between the Sexes

  • The author characterizes the relationship between men and women as a near-equal, brutal war with internal wounds.
    • Observes that many men fail due to female influence, and many women fail to discover their own desires, leading them to undermine men.
    • Quotes Freud's question, "What does a woman want?", noting the contemporary belief that women are now ready to answer.

Reality of the Rib

  • Women's response to Freud's question is presented as the idea that the reality of the rib is equal to the reality of Adam, suggesting equality between sexes.
    • Claims that if the penis is 1010 cubic inches at rest and the average person is 3,0003,000 cubic inches, then men and women are 99% identical.

SCUM - Society for Cutting Up Men

  • Quotes from the SCUM Manifesto by Valerie Solanis, who attempted to murder Andy Warhol.
    • The manifesto argues for the elimination of men and the reproduction of only females, claiming the male is a "biological accident."
    • SCUM describes the male as an incomplete female who spends his life seeking completion through women.
    • "The male is a biological accident: the Y (male) gene is an incomplete X (female) gene, that is, has an incomplete set of chromosomes. In other words, the male is an incomplete female, a walking abortion, aborted at the gene state."

Pussy Envy

  • The manifesto suggests that men have "pussy envy" rather than women having penis envy.
    • Argues that women are the largest and most exploited class, even more so than workers, colonial peoples, and blacks.
    • The author recognizes the life of the argument being on the side of women, even with personal prejudices.
    • Questions whether female success is Satanic if women are the true aggressors causing societal problems.
    • Suggests that a revolution of women could open social diseases to examination and offer hope.

Economic Treatment of Women

  • Women are indeed a class in terms of their economic treatment, supported by clear statistics.
    • In 1964, the income for a working female was 3,7103,710, while for a male it was 6,2336,233.
    • Women's median wages were barely 60% of men's wages; only 2% of those earning over 10,00010,000 a year were women.
    • Acknowledges that even men opposed to Women's Liberation agree on the need to amend the economic exploitation of females.

Economic Equality and Revolution

  • The real argument is that women cannot achieve economic equality without cultural and sexual revolutions.

NOW - National Organization for Women

  • The largest group in the women's movement, founded by Betty Friedan, with five thousand members, aims to achieve demands through lobbying and legislation.
    • Its Bill of Rights includes:
    • A Constitutional Amendment giving equal rights to women.
    • A law banning sex discrimination in employment.
    • Revision of tax laws to permit deduction of home and child-care expenses.
    • Child-care facilities established by law.
    • Equal education opportunities for women.
    • Revision of welfare laws to provide women with more dignity.
    • The right for women to return to their jobs after childbirth without loss of seniority and be paid maternity leave.
    • The right of women to control their reproductive lives through access to contraception and abortion.

Liberal vs. Radical Feminism

  • Compares the legislative proposals of NOW with the vague solutions of Women's Liberation.
  • Quotes Linda Phelps defining the difference between liberal and radical feminism:
  • In contrast to NOW's concrete list of legislative proposals, Women's Liberation appears vague because we talk about solutions which aren't apparent to most women, solutions which don't exist at all in anything we can point to in the U.S. like new families, the liberation of children, the end of traditional notions of masculinity and femininity.

Economic System Reform

Quotes Linda Phelps implying women won't get what they want without changing the economic system.

  • Concludes that fundamental change requires altering the economic system, but acknowledges the potential for extremism.

Revolution and Its Enigmas

  • Explores the enigma of revolution and questions whether it is a force for liberation or pollution.
    • Women's Liberation has pushed the author to question whether the revolution is the most beautiful or diabolical idea of man.

Sexual Revolution

  • States that beyond the economic and cultural revolution a sexual revolution remains the most important thing.

Kate Millett on Sexual Revolution

  • Calls upon Kate Millett to forecast the terms of the sexual revolution.
    • Quotes Millett on the requirements of a sexual revolution which would include elimination of sexual taboos, and a permissive single standard of sexual freedom.

Class Warfare and Sexual Revolution

  • In all previous consideration of class warfare there had been at least the assumption that the design of human beings was adequate, unbiased, functional, and not particularly in need of alteration
  • The ultimate logic of the sexual revolution required women to stand equal to the male body in every aspect

Equality and Reproduction

  • How could this equality prevail if women in competition with the other sex for the role of artist, executive, bureaucrat, surgeon, auto mechanic, politician, or masterful lover should have to cry quits every now and again for months of pregnancy plus years of uneasy accommodation between their career and their child, or else choose to have no children and so be obsessed with the possibility of biological harm, worse, the possibility of some unnameable harm to that inner space of creation their bodies would enclose?

Jacobin Revolutionary Principles

  • Principles being Jacobin.
  • It was never enough to sever the heads of the aristocrats. The time is now come to get the first Aristocrat of them all. Since He designed women at a disadvantage, such Work must be overthrown!