Tampa - Alissa Nutting

[LaRascasse]

This should give you some perspective on the book.

In a nutshell, it's about the exploits of a female teacher who is a sociopathic pedophile. All her waking thoughts center around various unspeakable things she thinks of doing (and eventually does) to her 14 year old male students.

Personally, I found the idea of the book halfway between distasteful and repulsive. In fact, I hated everything about it except one interesting social double standard that it brings up, so I posted it here. The double standard being how female sexual predators aren't held up to the same standards of punishment as their male counterparts for essentially the same crime. In case of the latter, they lock the sick pervert away and melt the key, while for the former, there are absurd statements like the victims "probably enjoyed it".

Here is a review which explores this aspect. An excerpt from this review is given below.

A novel told from the point of view of a remorseless sexual predator would be difficult enough for some readers and critics -- even Humbert Humbert expressed some remorse in Vladimir Nabokov's "Lolita," after all. But make that sexual predator a woman, and demonstrate that her actions in seducing a vulnerable young boy are hardly the harmless, "nudge-nudge, wink-wink" games depicted in media coverage of such women, and watch out.

Share your thoughts.

 

[Stella_Omega]

I agree.

Female sexual predators most often are minimised-- And their victims are mocked and shamed for being so unmanly (girlish) as to be victimised by a mere woman.

Our culture has eveloped an overriding myth that males are always up for it, that they can't help their urges, that the sight of naked flesh-- or even the knowledge that a body is female-- is like blood in the water to any man worthy of the title. It's ridiculous! But look how many people have bought into it!

And we refuse to believe that women can possibly be stirred by the same emotions, despite the evidence. Women should never want to say yes, much less pop the question themselves.

And thus, we have young men who are traumatised by their experiences with predatory women-- and even more so by the fact that they cannot admit to the trauma lest they lose their man card. Often, they will be assumed to have been the aggressor.

We have women who have been traumatised by their experiences with predatory men-- and even more so, in many cases, by the general notion of "What did you expect, he's a man, you should have known better!"


I'm not in favor of either option, personally.

But one thing... Male sexual predators are not so much locked up forever either. A couple of years, at best.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

NEWSFLASH.

Most women are predatory when it comes to sex. The boys need to man up and seize the opportunity.

 

[LaRascasse]

But one thing... Male sexual predators are not so much locked up forever either. A couple of years, at best.

What I meant was not so much the quantum of punishment, but the way the predator is seen by society and the media. James Hooker is a sicko, but Debra Lafave is "too pretty to go to prison" and Leena Sinha's best defense was that her victim "enjoyed every moment of becoming a man" with her.

The only cases where a female sexual predator is held to the same moral standard is when her victim is also female. Ask Claire Lyte.

 

[LaRascasse]

NEWSFLASH.

Most women are predatory when it comes to sex. The boys need to man up and seize the opportunity.

Sadly, you speak for the media.

 

[Stella_Omega]

What I meant was not so much the quantum of punishment, but the way the predator is seen by society and the media. James Hooker is a sicko, but Debra Lafave is "too pretty to go to prison" and Leena Sinha's best defense was that her victim "enjoyed every moment of becoming a man" with her.

The only cases where a female sexual predator is held to the same moral standard is when her victim is also female. Ask Claire Lyte.

Yes.

It's the same old same old; women get kindness and indulgence, -- deserved or not; men get respect and an assumption of competence-- deserved or not.

 

[Tyro999]

... Share your thoughts.

My thoughts are that there was sufficient info in your OP to arrive at the decision that I won't be reading Alissa Nutting's opus Tampa.