I think the analogy that she is proposing is that playing by the rules society dictates doesn’t make you a good person. Going against conventional attitudes and wisdom takes courage and can be the right thing to do. In this preface, Currer Bell is referring to literary critics, who were mostly men, and both men and women who held fast to what was considered a woman’s proper role in society. She is challenging them to rethink their traditional beliefs. The preface served to open the minds of would be readers so that they would judge the story on its merits. She uses the preface to unmask the many prejudices that readers would bring with them in evaluating her novel once they knew the gender of the author.