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Is A merican P sycho a Misogynist Text?
INTRODUCTION
¤IMMEDIATE MEDIA REACTION- Bans, Death threats
The immediate reaction to the publication of American Psycho in 1991 was one of heightened public media hysteria
which resulted in bans in Australia and Germany and death threats directed to both its author, Bret Easton Ellis, and
publishers
...

American author Naoimi Wolf condemned the book for what she saw as the incitement of violence against women
through the sexualisation of such acts, accusing Ellis of pairing scenes which would be conventionally very arousing to
a reader with scenes of “carnage that follow as a consequence of that eroticism”
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Norman Mailer for example argued that the text would make violent
men recoil from their own actions:

The female victims in American Psycho are tortured so hideously that men with the liveliest hostility toward
women will, if still sane, draw back in horror
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¤MARY HARRON LATER DEFENCE: portrait of misogyny not misogynistic
Later feminists such as the film director Mary Harron (director of the 2000 film version of the novel), corroborated this
defence by claiming that American Psycho is “a portrait of misogyny rather than misogynistic itself”
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èAIM OF ESSAY - buy into, and literally carry out, to their radical conclusions, all of the material and societal
myths propagated by a chauvinistic, image-based and consumerist social environment
This essay argues that American Psycho is a novel that satirizes what would happen if one were to buy into, and literally
carry out, to their radical conclusions, all of the material and societal myths propagated by a chauvinistic, image-based
and consumerist social environment, such as that of the high-flying, corporate Manhattan of the 1980s
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He himself declares,


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It is hard for me to make sense on any given level
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Indeed, as he buys into the myth that it is essential to use six different products to clean
his teeth :
(Plax antiplaque formula, Rembrant toothpaste, Probright tooth polisher, Interplak tooth polisher, Listerine, Cepacol),

Or that a new Redken product is essential to “prevent mineral deposits and prolongs the life cycle of the hair, he also
buys into the myth that Donald Trump is the apex of hegemonic masculinity and that “there are no girls with good
personalities”
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hegemony myth)
If trending in his social environment, Patrick Bateman will buy and buy into whatever his environment dictates: “on
Evelyn’s advice [I] pick up a Foltene European Supplement and shampoo”
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He justifies his actions
by violently affirming: “I… want… to… fit… in”, suggesting that his actions are ultimately driven by a deep-seated
desire to conform to a specific prototype, because other than that “there is no real me”
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èPatrick Bateman is thus the ultimate mindless, monstrous and unfiltered embodiment of the ideal consumer:
buying and buying into all that is externally advertised: including chauvinistic taglines: literalizing abstractliterally turning women into objects and meat
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2

PART 2
¤Thus Bateman converts social attitudes towards women into tangible reality- women:
THREE STEREOTYPICAL CATEGORIES:
èas dictated by patriarchal supremacy:
Thus Bateman converts social attitudes towards women into tangible reality, placing women into three stereotypical
categories, as dictated by patriarchal supremacy: women who are objectified whores or, “hardbodies”, which literally
become meat and household objects following coitus, women who are possessions and therefore reflections of social
status, and women who fit in neither category and are thus the worst possible criminals, posing a threat to normative
ideas about gender function and hierarchy
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WOMEN WHO ARE OBJECTIFIED WHORES- PIECES OF MEAT:
1) Women who are objectified whores or, “hardbodies”, which literally become meat and household objects
following coitus:
He keeps 3 vaginas in his gym locker – making these women into objects he keeps and collects
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WOMEN WHO ARE POSESSIONSSERVE SOCIAL STATUS- EXTENSION OF HIS BEING PATROCK BATEMAN:
2) Women who are possessions and therefore reflections of the man’s social status- in the same way that a car
would be:
Personal possessions or, more precisely, and extension of his being Patrick Bateman- objects that construct
social status to corroborate what he calls the “idea” of Patrick Bateman, as after all he just wants to “fit…
in…”, as he tells Bethany
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Jean- his secretary and plan B fiancée
3
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Does not gain complete sexual satisfaction from her despite trying- specifically because she is made to be in a
helpless weaker position- but does not originate as such
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Not being a “real”, self-defining personality induces a sense of insecurity and powerlessness (“my macabre joy sours and
I’m weeping for myself, unable to find solace in any of this” “I was simply imitating reality… Something horrible was happening and
yet I couldn’t figure out why”) which can only be assuaged by exerting power on something weaker
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èPsychologist Erich Fromm states that the sadist “ is sadistic because he feels impotent, unalive and powerless
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CONCLUSION:
¢American Psycho is “a portrait of misogyny rather than misogynistic itself” (Mary Harron),
èwhere the misogyny may be read as an inevitable by-product
èof a chauvinistic, image-based and consumerist society lived to its most extreme conclusions, where Patrick Bateman
represents:
èthe monstrous embodiment of the ideal consumer:
Buying and buying into all that is externally advocated
...

èDepicts misogyny and sadism as inevitable by-products of a chauvinistic, image-based and consumerist society
lived to its most extreme and fanatical conclusions

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