Premature Poly Ejaculation

[joreth]

Reading Robert Heinlein poly books is like the literary equivalent of having sex with a misogynistic Fake Feminist premature ejaculator:

Oh, that's nice. That's good, yes, keep doing that. That's great! Almost there ... almost ... what do you mean you're done? Oh, well, that's OK, we can still ... you mean you're just stopping? Right there? But we're so close! If you just ... what do you mean it's all my fault? Yes women should be responsible for their own orgasms, but that doesn't mean you aren't supposed to contribute anything at all! This is supposed to be a shared experience! That doesn't make you a feminist, that makes you a shitty lover.

I don't want to waste my time with a guy who may be decent at starting off, but stops short right when it starts to get good - not when there are plenty of other guys out there who can start out good and still follow through to the end, and who don't mask their condescension of women with intellectual snobbery.  No, it's not feminist if all the women in your books are tall, thin, blonde, have Ph.d's, but still want to stay at home and make your babies. 

And don't even get me started on the whole "no bi or gay male sex" thing, either.

Comments

[corpsefairy.livejournal.com]

Ahahahaha, perfect.

[redheadlass.livejournal.com]

Yes. I end up getting really annoyed at him. He's not held up well societally...

[james-the-evil1.livejournal.com]

Do you find that attitude to be the same in his last few books? Most of his literary critics note his attitude towards women as being one of the things that changed noticeably in his later novels. I'm ambivalent about it, he created stronger female characters (notably the protagonist of "Friday") but still often treated them in a less than stellar manner.

[joreth]

It's particularly frustrating when poly people try to defend him. The latest is that I should "respect" him because he was really progressive *for his time* and he was "the first" to say things even approaching polyamory.

Fuck that, he's sexist and we have better writers and role models now.

[joreth]

Unfortunately, his version of "strong female characters" is defined as "likes to fuck men a lot". Or, as someone once described to me, women who all "like sex and want to stay at home and have lots of babies, but they have PhDs so it's OK".

There are plenty of writers out there who have strong female characters and who address alternative sexual relationships and relationships. I don't need to wade through pages dripping with sexism and ego to get a few kind-of-OK storylines when there is no dearth of sci-fi writing out there.