THE BONOBO SISTERHOOD

How to fight patriarchy.

In her debut book, legal scholar and lawyer Rosenfeld, founding director of Harvard Law School’s Gender and Violence Program, paints a dark and dispiriting picture of a patriarchal society that subjects women to abuse and coercion, denying them recourse to protection under the law. In contrast, she celebrates the female alliances demonstrated by bonobos, humans’ close cousins, who successfully thwart male sexual aggression. By emulating what she calls a Bonobo Sisterhood, Rosenfeld argues, women can undermine patriarchy. Drawing on myriad legal cases, testimony, and anecdotes, the author identifies the male temper syndrome and assumption of male entitlement as primary causes of women’s victimization. Men rarely face consequences for domestic violence, while women must surmount considerable obstacles even to get an order of protection, which abusers easily evade. “Under US law,” she points out, “you have no right to enforcement of your order of protection, even if you live in a state that has a specific law mandating such enforcement.” Too often, a woman cannot find a way to hide from her aggressor; battered women’s shelters, even when available, are inadequate and disruptive. “When a woman leaves her abuser,” the author writes, “we know that he will stalk her, reassault her, and do everything in his power to bring her back under his control.” Rosenfeld examines the history of marriage and rape laws, crafted by and favoring men. For centuries, women could not bring charges of marital rape because wives were deemed the property of their husbands. The author also considers the consequences of hook-up culture, which normalizes compliance sex, “in which verbal and nonverbal cues go ignored and the woman acquiesces” and which often follow sexual scripts—including choking—that men have gleaned from pornography. Self-defense training, Rosenfeld asserts, should be part of an inclusive, empowering sisterhood in which women will stand up for and with one another.

Well-informed, insightful, and, sadly, timely.