Not All Dead White Men: Classics and Misogyny in the Digital Age

by Donna Zuckerberg

Overview

A Times Higher Education Book of the Week

A virulent strain of antifeminism is thriving online that treats women’s empowerment as a mortal threat to men and to the integrity of Western civilization. Its proponents cite ancient Greek and Latin texts to support their claims—from Ovid’s Ars Amatoria to Seneca and Marcus Aurelius—arguing that they articulate a model of masculinity that sustained generations but is now under siege. Not All Dead White Men reveals that some of the most controversial and consequential debates about the legacy of the ancients are raging not in universities but online.

“A chilling account of trolling, misogyny, racism, and bad history proliferated online by the Alt-Right… Zuckerberg makes a persuasive case for why we need a new, more critical, and less comfortable relationship between the ancient and modern worlds in this important and very timely book.”
—Emily Wilson, translator of The Odyssey

“Explores how ideas about Ancient Greece and Rome are used and misused by antifeminist thinkers today.”
—Time

“Zuckerberg presciently analyzes these communities’…embrace of stoicism as a self-help tool to gain confidence, jobs, and girlfriends. Their adoration of men like Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, and Ovid…is founded in a limited and distorted interpretation of ancient philosophy…lending heft and authority to sexism and abuse.”
—The Nation

“Traces the application—and misapplication—of classical authors and texts in online communities that see feminism as a threat.”
—Bitch Media

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674241411
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	10/15/2019
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	473,438
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Donna Zuckerberg is a Silicon Valley–based classicist who received her doctoral training at Princeton University. She is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Eidolon, a prize-winning online Classics magazine (www.eidolon.pub).

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

1 Arms and the Manosphere 11

2 The Angriest Stoics 45

3 The Ovid Method 89

4 How to Save Western Civilization 143

Conclusion 185

Glossary of Red Pill Terms 191

Notes 195

References 229

Acknowledgments 253

Index 255

Editorial Reviews

This brilliant new book offers a must-read analysis of classicizing antifeminist diatribes that will enlighten or serve as a timely warning to all liberals, as well as to members of the Alt-Right and Red Pill men’s groups (if only they would read it).

Paul Cartledge

Zuckerberg presciently analyzes [‘red-pill’] communities’ (and sections of Silicon Valley’s) embrace of stoicism as a self-help tool to gain confidence, jobs, and girlfriends. Their adoration of men like Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, and Ovid, whose Ars Amatoria earned him the reputation of being history’s first pickup artist, is founded in a limited and distorted interpretation of ancient philosophy, she writes, lending heft and authority to sexism and abuse.

The Nation

The book is an achievement… An admirable foray into the difficult and often distressing terrain of far-right politics, and an important contribution to the growing collection of essays, archives and discussions centered on the place of classics in today’s thorny political landscape.

Times Literary Supplement

If there was ever a time to dispel myths of racial and gender superiority, it is now. Donna Zuckerberg has written an important book to help us understand how the Western classical canon is weaponized to diminish the humanity of women by anti-feminist online communities. This is a must-read.

Safiya Umoja Noble

A chilling account of trolling, misogyny, racism, and bad history proliferated online by the Alt-Right, bolstered by the apparent authority of Greek and Latin Classics. Zuckerberg makes a persuasive case for why we need a new, more critical, and less comfortable relationship between the ancient and modern worlds in this important and very timely book.

Emily Wilson

Both a survey of the contemporary landscape the alt-right trawls, as well as a primer in the major Classical texts and precepts they (mis)use.

PopMatters

Required reading for classicists who want to understand how the works we study resonate in contemporary politics.

Bryn Mawr Classical Review - Ellen Muehlberger

Zuckerberg characterizes the ‘Red Pill’ online community as the corner of the internet dominated by men’s-rights activists, the alt-right, pickup artists, and the sex-eschewing communities known as Men Going Their Own Way…Virtually all these subgroups appropriate classical literature for their own purposes.

The Atlantic

A fearless online pioneer in her role as the editor of Eidolon, Zuckerberg is perfectly placed to guide us through the radicalized virtual territory of the Alt-Right. Not only does she force us to face the worst of what Classical authors say about male superiority and sexual privilege, weaponized in the roiling echo chambers of reddit, she also compels us to reflect on why we nonetheless teach and take pleasure in Greek and Roman texts.

Joy Connolly

With the proliferation of anti-feminist rhetoric online, the extreme right is using ancient philosophy to boost its credibility. As Stoic ethics moves from lecture halls to Reddit, classicist Donna Zuckerberg exposes this misappropriation, meant to enforce the concept of male superiority.

Nature

Traces the application—and misapplication—of classical authors and texts in online communities that see feminism as a threat.

Bitch Media

Zuckerberg argues that it is important to study why classical texts have been weaponized by [The Red Pill] and how, regardless of their ‘appropriation of antiquity,’ the ancient texts are already problematic themselves.

Los Angeles Review of Books blog

A clear explanation of the machinations of the red pill community…Offers some sense of how individuals with an interest in progressive politics might respond to not only the abuse of ancient works, but also to the works themselves. In dissecting the far right’s misuse of these texts, Zuckerberg opens the door to a reconsideration of what is and isn’t the ‘foundation of Western Civilization.’

Ploughshares

[Zuckerberg] is ideally placed to analyze the deeply unpleasant phenomenon of these men appropriating ancient authors—Ovid, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius—to try to bolster their vicious world view…This book is her attempt to document this appropriation of Classics by people who neither know nor care how limited their understanding is.

Spectator

Zuckerberg tracks the alt-right’s appropriation of the classics, from the use of classical texts among Men’s Rights Activists to the superficial use of Ovid as inspiration for pickup artists.

Boston Review - Joel Christensen

A clear-eyed look at the dangers of misogyny and racism underlying the reception of Classics. Zuckerberg strikes an admirable balance between defending the study of ancient Greek and Roman authors—those all too familiar ‘dead white men’—and rejecting the insidious assertions of patriarchy and white supremacy that the Alt-Right claims to derive from antiquity. This remarkable book never loses sight of what the Classics can mean to the next generation.

Gregory Nagy

Not just an incredibly important book that teaches readers about the tactics of a far-right, antifeminist online community, the ‘manosphere,’ but also demonstrates ways in which experts can use their knowledge to deconstruct the use and abuse of history.

EuropeNow

Explores how ideas about Ancient Greece and Rome are used and misused by antifeminist thinkers today.

Time

Explores how ideas about Ancient Greece and Rome are used and misused by antifeminist thinkers today.

Time

10/22/2018
Classicist Zuckerberg, the editor-in-chief of Eidolon, aims to take back the writings of the ancients from misogynist online communities where men claiming to be the “defenders of the cultural legacy of Western Civilization... weaponize Greece and Rome in the service of their agenda.” Hoping to promote broader understanding of the classics, Zuckerberg analyzes the subdivisions of the online “manosphere” or “red pill” community, identifying three main factions—men’s rights activists (MRAs), members of the pick-up artist community (PUAs), and “men going their own way” (MGTOW)—and looking at their claims that classical texts affirm a long, idealized tradition for their “reactionary gender politics.” For example, she writes, some assert that Ovid’s Ars Amatoria is a straightforward model for PUA techniques, and some MGTOW look to Stoic philosophy to justify a belief that women are unreliable because they are supposedly more emotional than men. Contradicting these readings, she gives nuanced context about the texts in their own times. Ultimately, though Zuckerberg’s profile of the red pill community is uncomplimentary and potentially alarmist, her detailed analysis and reasoned tone inadvertently give some credence to the red pillers’ textual analyses, being thoughtful and balanced (including in an admission that “Misogyny appears early in Greek literature”) where her opponents are facile and extreme. This work may be of more interest to those concerned about the manosphere than those seeking feminist readings of classical texts. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

With the proliferation of anti-feminist rhetoric online, the extreme right is using ancient philosophy to boost its credibility. As Stoic ethics moves from lecture halls to Reddit, classicist Donna Zuckerberg exposes this misappropriation, meant to enforce the concept of male superiority.

Nature Lib