"I Meet Toni's Mom" by Estragon. (an356608@anon.penet.fi). A young man is strongly attracted to a beautiful young woman; but when he tries to make love to her, she explains to him that this is not the way her mother taught her to do it. She explains that the purpose of men's existence is to please and serve women. They guy eagerly accepts this theory, and soon he earns (as well as a mere man can earn anything) the privilege of a visit to Mom, who begins his advanced training in submissiveness. There is very little actual sex in this story, and what sex there is is not sexy in the way I am accustomed to feeling turned on; but it's nonetheless very interesting.

Overall, the story resembles a fictionalized version of a feminist philosophical tract. To wit: "I mean, look at your testicles. With hardly an effort, a woman can cause them excruciating pain. They say you're only as strong as your weakest link. Links don't come any weaker than a man's balls. So what do you men do? You make your testicles your symbol of power, your sign of virility. I admit it, it takes balls to do a thing like that." And later: "A penis and testicles have little to recommend them aesthetically. They're tools and that's it. Women's tools, but stored on {men's} bodies because women's bodies are too beautiful to be cluttered with such things."

I personally don't buy the idea of the Superiority of Women - I'm willing to settle for equality; but throughout history subjugated groups have found it necessary to exaggerate their status or idealize their group in order to counter the second-class status to which they are subjected in real-life. (The Black power movement in America is another example. I doubt that Louis Farakan or Malcolm X and their followers really believe that Blacks are superior to whites. But the myth of superiority is an important component of asserting equality.) The previous sentences were philosophy; the present story is fiction. It does a good job of conveying the feeling that maybe women are at the center of the universe and men should be happy to spend their time serving women. Again, in real life I reject this notion; but by keeping it there in the back of my mind, I feel secure in automatically rejecting the dominant assertion that men are at the pinnacle of Western society. My impression is that lots of women who in real life have happy and reciprocally equal relationships with their husbands feel the same way I do about this and therefore enjoy stories like this.

I myself find it a lot easier to identify with this story than with one in which the woman is the submissive person. This is because I see a value in overreacting against oppression that is not present in succumbing to oppression. Ooops - too much philosophy again. But what do I know? I'm only a woman.

I felt that the main strength of the story was that it was uproariously funny - with a strong serious undertone. The mother and daughter who dominate the men in their lives do it casually and naturally, and the boys and men being dominated think their submission is perfectly acceptable - the most natural thing in the world.

The story reminded me in many ways of the Greek drama Lysistrata, an antiwar play by Aristophanes, in which the women of Greece put an end to the Peloponnesian War by denying the men fighting it their sexual favors.. In both cases, the plot is simple, the language sometimes coarse, and the situations often hilarious; yet they both make a powerful philosophical statement.

I think women (even those who like men) will greatly enjoy this story. I would be interested in hearing what male readers think of it. I assume that all but the most impotent and insecure men will enjoy it as well.