For time immemorial, sexual men have been congratulated and patted on the back for their prowess, while sexual women have been called names such as "tramp," "whore" and "slut." Leora Tanenbaum's book "Slut! Growing Up Female with a Bad Reputation" attempts to examine this point yet again by bringing up certain examples -- as well as her own experience -- about how society views the sexual woman. This paper examines how well Tanenbaum has proved her point. Bibliography lists 1 source.
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and women are treated differently when it comes to expressing sexuality. This theme is nothing new, nor is this the first time the topic has been written about. What makes
this book different, however, is that it incorporates Tanenbaums own experiences in high school, when she, herself was painted with the "slut" brush, and suffered terribly as a consequence. Overall,
the book does present an important statement, implying that women, who more or less benefited from the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s are being made to pay for
that revolution today with labels of "tramp" and slut. She writes the book, she says, because "a reputation acquired in adolescence can damage a young womans self-perception for years" (Tanenbaum,
2000, p. 229). Such a reputation makes her open to other forms of harassment and even rape, not to mention a lousy self-worth once these girls become adults (Tanenbaum, 2000).
Tanenbaum does make some credible points; however, the arguments she uses to support those points dont have a whole lot of steam.
Tanenbaums basic point is that the best way to damage a womans credibility in any field is to call her a slut (Tanenbaum, 2000). "For many men," she writes, "woman
equals sexual being, and sexual means sexually available all the time" (Tanenbaum, 2000, p. 116). She supports this point through use of several good examples such as the mother who
was charged with sexual abuse when she called a social service hotline to ask if feelings of sexual arousal were normal while breastfeeding (Tanenbaum, 2000). In another case, Tanenbaum uses
the case of a New Mexico reporter who had filed a sex discrimination law suite against the newspaper because of salary disparity; defense lawyers deposed her former lover to ask