This is a really interesting collection of feminist writings on a wide variety of topics. It looks at a number of topics the ramifications of which are still felt now such as the election of Trump and the rise of the far right. There are also moments of humour in what is in a parts a dark feminist opinion collection.

After a year later (I read most of this book in 2019), I have picked it up again to try to finish it but I simply cannot bring myself to keep reading. Don't get me wrong, it is a great book, an amazing piece of journalism, activism and feminism, and I think it is perfect for anyone interested in those texts/fields, or doing gender studies, or simply anyone that wants to know more about feminism from a news and facts perspective. I found the first essays/articles in the book amazing, they really hooked me and opened my eyes, but from then on, I only found it quite depressing and too intellectual/scholarly (not a read for fun), to be honest. And now, after reading a couple of articles again to see if I could finish the book, I can't bring myself to spend time darkeniny my mood. What I need now from feminism is not information (I've spent years doing that), I need healing. I get it, denunciation is needed, but I don't get anything from someone yelling injusticies right into my eyes. I need restorative action. And I need to read things that bring me joy, while being true and educating me, not read something that feels hopeless.

An entertaining essay collection from the leading polemicist although at times feels a little repetitive and at times lacks cohesion.

As with all Laurie Penny's work, I found this thought-provoking and insightful. I'd recommend this book to anyone with an interest in rad-feminism.

I had no idea just how frustrating this text was going to be. Penny is obviously disenfranchised with the world, particularly with American politics, but her essays feel rushed and incomplete. Her arguments often lack a conclusion, and her feminism is very much for her, rather than for all.

I loathed that she kept using the phrase ‘women and queers’. It implies that women cannot be queer, and that all queer people must be linked to but separate from womanhood. Honestly, it’s gross and dehumanising, and I don’t have the energy to waste on texts which want to other me.

I’m disappointed as the reviews indicated this to be empowering and well-written. If you’re seeking a book which is the epitome of white middle-class feminism, then you’ve found it.

Thank you to Netgalley, Laurie Penny and Bloomsbury Publishing for my arc of The Bitch Doctrine in exchange for an honest review.

Title: The Bitch Doctrine: Essays for Dissenting Adults
Author: Laurie Penny
Format read: Ebook
Publication date: new edition 14th June 2018
Page Count: 472 pages
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Genre: non fiction / politics
Star review: 🌟🌟🌟🌟

Synopsis: a collection of essays from feminist journalist Laurie Penny, discussing subjects such as Trump's ascent to power, Brexit, class, gender, race and sexuality.

This has been on my tbr for ages! I first heard about it when it was recommended in a magazine and I added it straight to my tbr, but it's taken a while for me to get to it and while I was dragging my feet a new, extended edition has been published so I jumped at the chance to read it for review.

'When did the message that girls can do anything get twisted into the edict girls must do everything?'

This book honestly meant so much to me.
Reading it reminded me that I'm not insane to believe that sexism and misogamy is still a thing in a world that likes to pretend it's not. In a world where some women actually put in their twitter bio that they're 'anti feminism', in a world where we are repeatedly told that feminism is not needed or that we can't stick up for our gender, make any decisions about our own rights without that stupid triggered meme being posted or being called a snowflake. I know you know which meme I mean.

Laurie writes with a much needed honesty about the world we live in. It's good to know I'm not the only one who feels sad and often angry when I see women being dragged down in the name of 'anti feminism'. The frustration that no matter how much you try and explain, privileged white males will continue to ignore you or answer with a 'triggered' meme. It gets exhausting. But Laurie brings a fresh perspective and the inspiration to fight another day. Be it calling Ivanka Trump's 'inspiring' (not) book 'about as feminist as a swastika shaped bikini wax' or calling Donald an 'evil baby' I laughed so much with the true enjoyment of knowing that laughing at them can make it feel better.

But despite the many laugh out loud references that make it clear that Laurie is an incredibly talented and articulate writer, the topics covered in this book are for the most part not a laughing matter. Sometimes it's easier to bury your head in the sand and pretend that it's all ok, that men aren't still running the world (or trying to), to believe that there's no such thing as a pay gap or that women shouldn't be promoted because they might just want some maternity leave, you know so that they can keep 'having it all'. It is drummed into us now as young women that we should aim to have a career, but also still get married and have babies too, to just have it all! What Laurie points out is that instead of being given the right to a career as a choice it's kind of loaded on to us now that is not an 'or' but an 'as well as'.

I won't babble on for any longer but what I will say is that everyone should read this book! It doesn't just cover gender politics but queer politics, racial politics and class politics too. It's important and it will change your perspective so much, go read it!

This intelligent and thoughtful series of essays from this renowned author are well worth the read. She captures the mood of the times perfectly.

I dare you not to become a feminist after reading this book. Laurie Penny nails it again and it's about time you all read her stuff..

In her collection of essays, Bitch Doctrine:Essays for Dissenting Adults , written in a three years period and up to the election of Donald Trump, Laurie Penny shows that feminism today is about inclusiveness and intersectionality. There is a lot of stuff in this book, a lot of different topics. Laurie’s writing is smart, provocative, emotional, thoughtful. She questions many of the underlying assumption that structure our lives and probing identity issues. We are not just women. We are women with different bodies, gender expressions, sexualities. We are humans full of contradictions and differences and we need to take these differences into account and how they affect us. Without this kind of inclusion, as Roxane Gay says, our feminism is nothing. Feminism needs to take into account the needs of women of colour, queer women, transgender women. “In the end,” writes Laurie Penny, “feminists and the LGBT community have all this in common: we’ are all gender traitors. We have broken the rules of good behaviour assigned to us at birth and we have all suffered for it.”
I don’t agree with everything Penny says, but there is a lot of food of thought in this collection. There is a great deal of humour too, and understandably, a great deal of anger too. I liked the energy and the passion on her essay “The women’s march and the triumph of the won’t” about the women’s march in Washington, a day after Trump’s inauguration, on 23 January 2017. I found her views about James Bond on the essay ‘The Tragedy of James Bond“, witty and hilarious. Perhaps the most interesting to me was the essay “Let’s not abolish sex work; let’s abolish all work,” which talks about the porn industry and capitalism and connects them in ways that I haven’t thought before.

This collection of essays is a provocative call for action. As Laurie Penny says in the introduction,

"The title is a provocation, but so is the rest of the book. How could it be otherwise? Anything any woman ever writes about politics is considered provocative, an invitation to dismissal and disgust and abuse, in much the same way that a short skirt is considered an invitation to sexual violence. That’s the point. I have learned through years of writing in public that if you are a woman and political, they will come for you whatever you say—so you may as well say what you really feel. If that makes me a bitch, I can live with that."

As a culture, patriarchy exists as a set of rules and values that specify how men and women should act in order to be safe and protected. Breaking the patriarchical rules can have real consequences. Women need to find their own voice. Only then we become able to communicate our own feelings, and to pick up the feelings of others we would be able to dismatle the structures of hierarchy.

For fans of other reads of this type, for example Fight Like A Girl and Women and Power, this fits in nicely, although nicely might not be the right word, more like uncomfortably, as this is another fire in your belly read for any female out there.

A great collection of passionate essays, a collection celebrating one of the most celebrated female voice of this generation.

And what more, a funny and entertaining book that makes a point but doesn't preach until you can't take anymore!

Laurie Penny had not previously crossed my radar but, having seen good reviews, I leapt at the chance to read this collection of her writing from the last 5 years or so and am so pleased I did. She writes cogently, eloquently and with terrific energy about the state of the world as she sees it, through 30-ish year old eyes. I am at least twice her age, was involved in feminist arguments at a similar age in the 1970s (and since), so the appeal of this collection for me was its modern take on the question of equality, not least the many cultural references that were entirely new to me. I most enjoyed the latter articles - the more personal, conversational ones - and have come away from this book thinking not only that I’ve learned a few things but that I’ll be looking out for Laurie’s future articles wherever they are published.

Before reading this I actually watched a lot of Laurie Penny's talks on YouTube, essentially everything that is on YouTube to watch. It made me incredibly excited to read Bitch Doctrine, it seems like this book has been popping up everywhere.

Penny writes about so many issues within society including gender, identity, and sexism. They were all written about with such a strong voice that demanded my attention. I was a sociology student in university and this book would have helped me so much throughout my studies.

This book of essays should be used as a guide to understanding how powerful feminism is.

I gave up on this the 1st time i tried to read it, but picked it up sporadically over the last 6 months and tried to read it with an open mind.

I still think this is one for hardcore feminists. Whilst i am a feminist and proudly so, some of the things in this book were a bit much even for me.

Gosh, I love Laurie Penny! She's bold and brash and rude and uncompromising and passionate - and just so, ya know, *sensible*. Collecting together essays and articles from about 2013-17, this sees her exploring all manner of identity politics from an activist's standpoint: she really, genuinely, wants to change the world and for the better.

Her range of topics stretches from the expected feminism, racism, homophobia, rape culture to James Bond, the new Barbies ('so Barbie has curves now. Sort of.... four new body shapes: skeletal, tall and skeletal, short and skeletal, and slightly less skeletal')., Trump (of course!) and general deconstructions of patriarchal capitalism.

She's funny (look out for Little Kettle Man which had me snorting out loud with laughter) and snarky ('But that would be too cynical; the global fashion industry really cares about young women's health now. That's why model agencies were recently discovered recruiting outside Swedish eating disorder clinics.') and inclusive in the widest, best tradition of the Left. What a shame, then, she's probably preaching to the converted...

This was a really interesting collection of essays by Penny. I really enjoyed the mix of topics that Laurie covered. I must admit I did skip the two or three that focused solely on Trump. This is a really well-written collection and I would recommend this for anyone interested in feminism. Laurie Penny provides the reader with her opinion clearly and intelligently.

Funny stories and real opinion. Being honest in the whole book and tells stories and experiences, which could be eye opening. I really enjoyed the book

"I have learned through years of writing in public that if you are a woman and political, they will come for you whatever you say - so you may as well say what you really feel. If that makes me a bitch, I can live with that."

Bitch Doctrine by Laurie Penny is a collection of essays on everything from love, resistance and violence to culture, gender and mental health. I'd read Unspeakable Things by the author before, and I always love that she packs a massive punch in her writing. Reading this book, there's so many moments of realisation where Penny sums up perfectly what you think or feel about a certain topic, or portrays an argument that just suddenly seems to totally make sense. I loved this book!

Very engaging because it is so forthright. These essays fit into the whole #me too, misogyny debate of our time and do give food for thought. I do think it is worth remembering that there are differences between the UK and USA though. I'd use it to give students of gender studies food for thought and it's also useful in the debate about feminism in the 21st century.

A collection of essays from Laurie Penny, Bitch Doctrine for me is a collection of her highlights that I have through reading this googled and sent to people, thinking this is very relevant.

Penny’s writing style is one of my favourites, a sharp wit that delivers hard truths and pauses for thought, Bitch Doctrine for me brings together some of the best of those moments where the author shares personal moments with her politics - The personal is political, and books such as this highlight that.

A breadth of topics are covered from agency to culture, that make poignant and important reads. A book that relishes in it’s fury at how the world works, it attacks these issues in the right ways - particularly American Politics which Laurie Penny is immersed in during this book.

A great and comprehensive collection of essays from a perspective on the left that is difficult to stop reading.