Misogyny

There is a prevalent air of misogyny in Catch-22, and Yossarian is the prime culprit, a womanizer who sleeps with any woman he can. He does not factor in his or their feelings; he only wants to have as much sex as possible with as many women as possible. The perfect girl for him is one who will have sex with him and not care about him after they are through. When he meets Luciana, he tells her he wants to marry her because he feels he has fallen in love. His feelings for her are out of the ordinary, but when she gives him her number, he still tears up the piece of paper out of habit. He treats women as objects for his pleasure, so when one actually affects him, he is confused. He does not even know how to treat a woman with respect or love, so he loses his chance to be with Luciana, whom he actually cares about.

Aarfy takes misogyny to an extreme. He actually rapes a girl and kills her, feeling no remorse for his actions. This comes as a surprise, for Aarfy does not seem depraved like Hungry Joe. Hungry Joe desperately tries to take pictures of naked women and have sex with them. He is almost like a wild animal, a creature in need, and his needs are visceral. Aarfy, however, displays restraint with women, talking to them for hours and even taking them home, but not sleeping with them for fear he would be " taking advantage" of them. When he commits the rape, it becomes clear that he only acted with such chivalry before because it fit his idea of manners, not because he respected any of the women he courted or cared at all about them as individuals. When he feels like it, neither rape nor murder goes against his desires; most of the time, he simply finds these actions coarse but does not reject them on principle. Heller's military is a man's world, and women occupy a small and specialized part of it. They are bit players who only serve as accessories to men.

In some ways, the men's careless and sometimes cruel pursuit of women in the novel is a response to their lack of control in the military. They react to the severities of war by ravaging (for the most part) innocent women. They react to their dangerous situation and lack of control by taking control of what they see as conquests they can conquer, members of the " weaker sex." Their emotional distance from women is also a reflection of the aloofness they feel in their daily lives as soldiers. They are emotionally desensitized from combat; getting attached to anyone seems pointless when tomorrow could bring a transfer to another island, papers sending them home, or the deadly mission that will end the war for them in a different way. Misogyny is a form of psychological protection for many of the men.