Kidnykid's Full Review: Charlotte Davis Kasl - Women, Sex and Addiction: A...
Charlotte Davis Kasl, PhD, is a psychologist who has a particular affinity for New Age philosophies and ways of looking at things. Like many New Agers, she believes strongly that there is no one right way to become a spiritual person, and this attitude is reflected in her work, either covertly or bluntly.
In WOMEN, SEX, AND ADDICTION, Dr. Kasl deals forthrightly, yet compassionately, with the subject of compulsive sexual behavior in women. She also deals implicitly with the fact that compulsive sexuality is often confused, in women, with simple sexual enjoyment, as well as the race and class differenes we still experience on a daily basis.
All of this is accomplished with such aplomb, however, that I never felt preached at. Dr. Kasl is that talented a writer; I never once felt as if I were reading merely a list of New Age cliches or psychobabble, nor did I feel she was being strident or insistent that "my way is the only way to think about these issues." I find this to be an occupational hazard of most feminist-oriented written material nowadays; when one learns that Dr. Kasl is an unabashed feminist who understands all too well the difficulties we face in the modern world, given the way many women like her write, the natural tendency (at least on the part of this reviewer) is to think in terms of looking for all the little things that would tip us off to her true radical nature. No such luck - Dr. Kasl genuinely gives us the heart and soul of those she talks about, without resorting to ideological blather.
Three features are special standouts. The first one which comes to mind is the actual case histories she tells of the addicts she talks about, interspersed through the entire book. These women are awesome! I learned to admire each and every one of them, even if I didn't agree with their life choices. Dr. Kasl presented each woman in a nearly-journalistic fashion, which is the secret of the success of these case histories. If Dr. Kasl becomes especially attached to one of them, you find out about that. You're not left to guess, based on language which obviously plays favorites by implication, just who Dr. Kasl's special heroes are; she tells you in so many words which ones she prefers, in a way which leads you to draw your own conclusion. That is a rare ability, one which all nonjournalistic writers should strive to imitate.
Next comes the chapter on men. She devotes an entire chapter to men, because men, too, get shortchanged by the way society treats them. When it comes to the specific topic of women and sexual addiction, men are supposed to just love a woman who wants to do nothing but have sex. They aren't allowed to refuse to have sex with a woman; their very identities as men are at stake every time a woman attempts to seduce them. Even if she tries to seduce him, he is expected to consent to sex, and then report to his friends the next morning what a great time he had in bed the night before, leading them to believe he was the seducer. This societal setup almost forces men to be sexually codependent; however, because men are almost universally seen by society as the seducers, and women the sexual codependents, treatment programs assume that the man is the addict and the woman the controlling codependent and adjust their treatment programs accordingly. In other words, men get untreated in alarming numbers because they are encouraged to become hooked on pleasing their buddies by appearing to seduce women. This is patently unfair; it's only part of the problem, and Dr. Kasl doesn't make any bones about that, but it is a big problem.
Finally, Dr. Kasl includes guidelines for comprehensive change. Those guidelines are truly comprehensive, in the sense that she includes guidelines for the wider society as well as ones for recovering sex addicts and codependents. What's refresing is that these guidelines do not include standard end-of-inpatient-addiction-treatment nostrums. Nor do they include unilateral lifelong attendance at 12-step groups. They are unabashedly different. You might not agree with all those guidelines; I certainly don't. The important thing is that she included the guidelines in the first place, because addicts have to function out there in the real world, and there is always the possibility that they will be forced by circumstances to return to their addictive behavior. The real world has to change, as well as the addict. Dr. Kasl is right about that much.
WOMEN, SEX AND ADDICTION is the sort of book I'd recommend for treatment professionals in particular, to balance the somewhat repetitive nature of the material produced by Patrick Carnes (who himself recommends Dr. Kasl's work, by the way). It is also good for women who are highly motivated to want to change themselves, and by extension, to help to change society. It's a long book, somewhat heavy going in spots, but it must be read and talked about. The issues Dr. Kasl brings up in its pages are necessary topics of discussion - honest discussion - if change is ever to be implemented in our society's attitudes about sex.
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