What I find interesting about Maureen Dowd is that she's actually challenging the tyranny of romantic love in this culture, almost as much as she's questioning the tyranny of men (for sure, the two are related. What a handy way to control the ambitions and passions of young women if we tell them from a young age to focus all their talent and energy on attracting a man).

I love the fact that her statement "not everybody gets everything" single-handedly equalizes "everything": a pulitzer, great friends, personal fullfillment, romantic love. It is clear that she doesn't have romantic love up on the giant, heart-shaped pedastal that we are all trained to have.

It is an old, old tradition that a woman without romantic love must have an empty, hollow, life, and reader responses are rife with the suspicion that Ms. Dowd must secretly lie awake at night with gnawing feelings of missing something. We are a society that refuses to cherish all types of love, all types of experience, and is fixated on one and only one form of 'fullfillment': the achievement of a romantic love that correlates with what is portrayed in movies. The closer the correlation, the better.

What a collossal waste of time, and what an easy way to distract a lot of young girls. What a huge cause of divorce.

Ms. Dowd's love of her friends is love, her love of her work is love, her love of her mother. Love is love. I hope she doesn't fall into the trap we all do so often of minimizing these by comparison to what love is "supposed" to be. I hope she sleeps soundly, full of appreciation for the very real love she has in her life.

I'll answer her title's question: No, romantic love is not necessary. Love is necessary. Being known is necessary. Intimacy is necessary. But those all take many, many, equally valid forms.

Levraphael remembers as I do. Even before that NASCAR episode, there was the Seven Dwarves reference, her epithet for the Democratic Party's field of presidential candidates. Mostly, they were serious candidates-- or at least serious-thinking candidates-- and deserved better. And so did we, the public, especially given the rest of the BigMedia's (lack of respectable) coverage in 2004.

In fact, I was pretty incensed then, and all things considered, my reactions (including heated letters, both to Ms. Dowd, and the Public Editor, and later on, a blog post) seem pretty mild... in retrospect.

That being said, I did think that the furor about her book was a bit overblown (and according to RT, my hunch about the editing of the excerpts was correct). BUT... where were all of these commenters when Dowd was writing about the events that would eventually have an effect on all our lives? (Perhaps they were doing as I was, and deciding to start blogs.)

Still, I must admit to appreciating some of the same elements of style in her writing that Ransom does, but that only makes it even more infuriating when she writes such things as the above examples. Really, I would be happier if she were to continue to write about popular culture and gender politics (I love Hepburn & Loy, too!) on a regular basis, or even for SNL, but left (real) Politics for those who actually care about the outcome and are less careless with those important issues affecting our (non-elitist) lives. [Think Bob Herbert, or Molly Ivins, if you would have humor.]

Ironically, one of the recent profiles mentions that she finds very few women with whom to discuss Politics. I wonder why? Isn't it interesting that Dowd, despite all of her power & access, still gets plenty of dates, while I, with so little real power, can have numerous women friends-- married & single working mothers & grandmothers-- with whom I may have serious discussions about politics?

To me the question isn't about whether men are necessary, but why do we care so much whether a woman--any woman--has one or not? Why do we feel a need to pyschoanalyze a heterosexual woman who hasn't "settled down" and married in a way that we don't seem to do with heterosexual men? This certainly suggests that feminists have more work to do!

I don't see marriage, partnership, or romance as a necessity--just as icing on the cake of an already fulfilling life.

Seems like this is a good thing. Wonder if it is possible for men to find this?

Single women spend tons of time rationalizing why its ok to be single, why it's because of all the unsuitable men, because it's "just as valid" to be loved by your cats and your mother and your girlfriends. As another poster wrote, a normal heterosexual --- male or female --- who has experienced deep, fulfilling, mature love knows that most careers and no material things could possibly hold a candle to the spiritual growth and emotional security that comes from a loving and stable relationship. The rare exceptions would be artists or scientists who are actually contributing something very important to humanity and are wrapped up in their work, but for the rest of us schlubs our careers aren't even close to saving the world. Marriage and children are the best ways to contribute to the future for the average person.

Men are just as necesarry now, if not for physical survival than for every other imaginable reason. Men and women need each other to become full and mature human beings, and remaining single is not usually an empowering feminist choice but a sad comment on the karma created by a lifetime of selfish pursuits.

If Ms. Dowd found her dream guy and got married, I highly doubt she'd be talking about whether men are necesarry. I hope she does find one.

I can't wait to read this book. It sounds like a reflection of the many contradictions I've been wrestling with for years. You can love men and not like living with them. You don't have to be bitter or lesbian or asexual to arrive at such a conclusion, either.

Some women LOVE being the object of men's desire, they just adore getting down on their knees to scrub the floor, suck him off, or polish the bottom of his toilet. Like girls who've been sold into sexual slavery, it's the only life they know. But women who've had many experiences, including success on their own terms see that the vast majority of men need to be on top (in virtually every way) or their smiles turns upside down. It's the only model that seems to work for 'em in the long haul. So who needs that? It's boring. To think that as a woman matures and comes into her own she begins to threaten men is so sad you end up laughing because crying about it is pointless.