Title: Savage Love from A to Z
Author: Dan Savage
Rating: 2 stars / 5 stars
Favorite Quote: “I expect my partner will find other people attractive…just as I will. I expect my partner to meet many of my sexual needs…but not all of them. I expect my partner to meet many of my emotional needs…but not all of them. And I expect my partner will violate my trust and that I will have to forgive them for the relationship to survive…just as I will violate their trust and need their forgiveness for the relationship to survive. If you expect your partner won’t find other people attractive, you will be disappointed. If you expect your partner to meet all of your sexual and emotional needs, you will be disappointed. If you expect your partner to cut off their family or to never confide in their friends or to forgo certain pleasures [] because their family or friends or coworkers make you feel insecure, sooner or later you will be disappointed. Because there are only so many sacrifices a person will make to be in a relationship. And if you expect your partner to never violate your trust…and if you’re incapable of forgiving someone for violating your trust…you will be disappointed.” Dan Savage. Savage Love from A to Z. E-book ed., Sasquatch Books, 2021.
Review: I received a free e-ARC from the publisher, Sasquatch Books, through the NetGalley platform, in exchange for an honest review.
I want to start off by saying that the parts of this book I liked, I really liked. Savage has a great, engaging tone, and the main point of his work is that people need to rethink their thoughts on sex and relationships, because those thoughts have been molded by a seemingly harmful, puritanical society that shames sex and relationships that may, in fact, be healthy for the people seeking them. I 100% agree with that.
I also enjoy the illustrations. In concept, and in parts of its execution, this book is a fun, insightful read.
My primary criticism falls with a few pieces of advice that I feel like could be misconstrued by people seeking to justify harmful or toxic behaviors. Two portions, in particular, jumped out as being advice that could easily be misinterpreted. The first is the discussion of “secret perving.” The other is the discussion of “maintenance sex.”
With regard to the idea of “secret perving,” part of his hypothesis sounds fine - when he gives examples of business men wearing lingerie under their work clothes or couples wearing sex toys or vibrating underwear under their clothing - those parties are completely focusing on their own bodies and choices. I don’t think there’s a problem with that at all. However, his first example in this section is of a foot fetishist working in a shoe store. This example, of someone whose “secret perving” directly involves another, nonconsenting person (here the person going into a shoe store, not realizing the person helping them is also fetishizing them), seems less straightforward and seems to run a significant risk of abuse and potential harm. Perhaps this is just the limitations of pithy, short anecdotes instead of in-depth analyses of complex issues surrounding consent, but there does seem to be a difference between covert expressions of kink that only involve the person engaging that kink (something that should not be shamed or discouraged) and covert expressions of kink that necessarily involve another person who doesn’t know or consent to their involvement - and this is a distinction Savage seems to gloss over and doesn’t explore at all.
The other issue I took with this book is the concept of “maintenance sex.” Savage defines this concept as: “[s]ometimes consent is granted without much enthusiasm - one person is horny, the other person is not, and the nonhorny partner agrees to get the horny partner off.” Dan Savage. Savage Love from A to Z. E-book ed., Sasquatch Books, 2021.
Much like the shortcomings of the “secret perving” discussion above, my criticism of this concept centers again on its lack of nuance. My concern is that without a more nuanced exploration, the answer to the question “where is the line here?” remains unanswered. While Savage does later go on to emphasize that no one is entitled to sex from their partners, this idea of “maintenance sex” muddies the waters there in a way that is unnecessary and possibly harmful. I don’t think this is Savage’s intent, and I do think much of the book has positive messages about the importance of consent, but this particular section just seems to fall short of that message.
About that Quote: I think this quote illustrates the best aspects of this book - setting and managing expectations through effective communication with regard to sexual and romantic relationships.
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