In Taboo, 25-year-old Hannah Ferguson urges her readers to break down Taboos; to talk about what we are conditioned not to – sex, money, friendship, and career. She argues that building and allowing continuing taboos around these subjects is holding women back from overthrowing the patriarchy and forging stronger ties among the sisterhood.
Publication of her book follows from her recently published article about her abortion, which she shared in the lead-up to both the USA election but also the Queensland state election (that’s in Australia!) where, by some troubling tomfuckery, somehow legalised abortion was put back on the table as a right that should be rewound. What a time to be alive, right?
All that is to say, I love Hannah. I listen to her podcast Big Small Talk each week and find her a very engaged and educated speaker, and I want to know her thoughts and opinions on a range of subjects.
In Taboo, much of the content unfortunately re-treads areas that I am finding are saturated in the media I consume at the moment. Lamenting about female friendship breakups is So Hot Right Now; however, others have shared their experiences in a far more in-depth and compelling way. I didn’t find Fergusson’s insights to bring anything new to the discourse. Similarly, there is a section in which she writes a letter to the male partner of her friends. Within, she espouses the importance of equality and generosity in a way that, in 2024, is neither ground-breaking nor (I would have hoped) necessary. But I guess it needs saying, because she is saying it.
Though a lot of the content was a fairly standard affair, the insights she shared about her experience on the Gen Z dating scene left me genuinely shocked. To hear first-hand what it’s like on the dating scene in 2024 for people in their 20s was horrible. With her trademark total transparency and great introspection, Ferguson shares her experiences with males and their clueless brutality. Choking, assault, love-bombing, and creeping were all a feature. She painted a truly disturbing picture of the dating scene and I sincerely hope she is okay. Thankfully, she shared that her current boyfriend is far more evolved than those who came before, but in a way this was the saddest part of all for me. The palpable relief she expresses at finding a partner who is not actively hurting and ignoring her makes him seem like a knight in shining armour, when he fact he sounded more to me like a man doing the absolute bare minimum to be a decent human people. For instance, she shares her experience with vaginismus and painful sex, and heaps praise on her current partner who pauses his thrusting when she winces in pain. Give the man a medal, right? I mean no disrespect to Ferguson or her boyfriend with my assessment here. I am genuinely concerned that the bar has fallen THAT LOW. While admittedly it’s been a decade since I was dating, as a millennial, I never experienced the sort of horrific behaviour she encountered so regularly on the dating scene. It seems things have gone seriously wrong with the young men of Australia. Taboo, indeed.
If Ferguson’s experience is anything to go by, the kids are definitely NOT okay. And I hope the right people read her book and take it to heart.
I continue to admire Ferguson for her bravery and appreciate her insights into the Gen Z experience. Overall, 3 drive-thru maccas thickshakes out of 5.