Book Club Guide
The book is divided into three parts: the Problem, the Pivot, and the Promise.
The Problem is set forth in the first five chapters. It can get heavy and at times, triggering. If at any point, you find yourself distressed at all, please feel free to skip ahead to Chapter Six: A Self Worth Defending. The book is an uplift from there on, with caveat that Chrystul Kizer’s story (Chapter Seven) is potentially triggering.
Question 1
Chapter One sets the scene for the current state of how society treats domestic violence: an unfortunate, but not alarming, occurrence. It’s astounding given daily reports of men killing women in intimate partner relationships.
Chapter Two digs into how we got to where we are. Legal history offers clear and somewhat astonishing context about how male supremacy is encoded into laws that made men kings of their own castles, like “governors” of their family-states. This history raises the important question of whether law can be reformed to treat women as equal citizens.
What do you think? What surprised you most about these chapters?
Question 2
Chapter Three presents the concept of “the language of violence.”
In what ways is violence like a language? Do you see gendered differences in permission to speak this language?
Question 3
Living in our society, how do you see ways in which women are divided against themselves? How can we work together to overcome these situations?
Question 4
Chapter Four presents the “Theory of Patriarchal Violence” as the level of violence necessary to preserve a patriarchal social order. It reviews two Supreme Court cases which hold 1. That women have no federal civil right to be free from gender-motivated violence, (US v. Morrison) and 2. That an endangered woman is not entitled to enforcement of an order of protection, even in a state that has a statute mandating exactly this enforcement (Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales.)
More recently, in Dobbs, the Supreme Court struck down a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy.
Male primates use various types of sexual coercion to control females as reproductive resources. Yet female bonobos have challenged successfully such coercion, resulting in reproductive autonomy.
Discuss the potential of women regaining sexual autonomy through activating female alliances, like bonobos.
Question 5
Chapter Five introduces the concept of “compliance sex.”
Why might women (in heterosexual relationships) sometimes find it easier to go along with sexual acts that they do not affirmatively want? How can groups of women change what goes on in one-on-one situations?
Question 6
How does “compliance sex” relate to questions raised in Chapter Four about reproductive autonomy? In what ways do restrictions on reproductive health care for women matter for compliance sex situations?
Question 7
Chapter Six “A Self Worth Defending” is the Pivot. Self defense changes everything! It teaches you from the outside-in that you can defend yourself; and from the inside-out that you have a self worth defending! Once you learn this, you can envision more easily defending your sisters.
Key to the whole book is The Bonobo Principle, which is two parts. First, no one has the right to harm your sister. Second, everyone is your sister. It’s really that simple. If you let this principle animate your life, you will be bonobo. It will change the world.
Chapters Seven, Eight and Nine ask us to reimagine equality in a new way. Instead of sex equality being about how women measure up to men, what if we start from the premise that all women are created equal? What if instead of limiting our thinking about economics and resources to current capitalist structures, women defined and valued our own resources and deliberately shared them amongst our sisters?
What do you think? How do we move from a worldview of scarcity to one of abundance?
Question 8
Remember that bonobos created this social order without a constitution!
What would law look like in bonobo-land?
Engage with the Sisterhood
Use the Self-Worth
Defending Hub
Knowing that you have a self worth defending is the first step. Learning self-defense can be transformative!
Build Your
Bonobo Sisterhood
Connect with women in your community through online group chats, forum platforms, and in-person gatherings. Together, create a supportive network to uplift and empower one another.
Form Female Alliances Through Book Clubs
Connect with fellow bonobos, share The Bonobo Sisterhood: Revolution Through Female Alliance's empowering message, and foster strong, transformative female alliances.
