Unknown Speaker  00:21
Power of cooperative learning is that we're going to be having slides. And then what I want you to look at the real thing we have

Unknown Speaker  00:36
is from Washington DC assuming inspiration and traveling down east coast with a slideshow called looking for courage. She's a lesbian travel photographer has been working with us about 20 years or

Unknown Speaker  00:51
so from Vegas. And I'm always there when something

Unknown Speaker  00:55
was happening, getting pushed outside. But we actually had a great shot because anybody else has managed to get. So we're very lucky to have that and we'll be getting just a very minute glimpse of what has shown and then we will move on.

Unknown Speaker  01:14
Lot of your discussions with everyone on the show didn't bring me with

Unknown Speaker  01:23
Thank you. I'm glad I'm not part of the real thing that takes a lot of pressure off me. I'm going to try to go very fast to share as much as possible with you of Seneca. Seneca creating a community of resistance to nuclear weapons. And could we have this row of lights off please, and to all ways of war. Seneca was of course, a community of women, women confronting the war makers calling for peace and justice, challenging the old while trying to envision and live something new. And I'd like to add that was directly inspired by the brave women of Greenham Common, who are still there, regardless of what you may read in the mass media. For most of the 12,000 women who have been at the encampment since it began July 4 1983, I believe the experience was energizing and empowering, bringing back or creating a real commitment to direct action, which is what we need so much today. I felt the spirit of the encampment is one of fury and rage, celebration and joy, rowdiness and responsibility. And in this slide, we immediately pick up on two of the basic symbols or themes of the feminist peace movement, the weapons and the web. The weapons represent the watermakers the patriarchal approach to the world based on domination, and hierarchy and the web, which you may be able to see the yarn in the front represents the women and the feminist approach, that everything is connected and works in circles. The weapon here is a replica of a cruise missile, one of two, new first strike that is offensive weapons nuclear weapons designed to attack missiles in their silos. 464 cruise missiles are scheduled for deployment in Europe more elsewhere. It was the hope of the encampment to halt deployment of these first strike weapons. Now our goal is to halt and reverse the deployments. The Persian to deployed in West Germany can hit targets inside the Soviet Union, probably as far as Moscow in six to eight minutes. This is a drastically reduced warning time it shortens the time left to discover monitoring errors in the computerized surveillance system. This encourages the Russians to launch their missiles when they think an attack is coming. This is called launch on warning and is obviously very, very dangerous. But the threat of nuclear annihilation can still be very abstract. You know when you're struggling to survive on a daily basis. The arms race is killing people every day. Every hour, the United States alone spends $30 million on the military, and every hour people die of deprivation. The trade offs are direct and undisguised. Money is transferred from human needs. Due to military greed, and a fruitless quest for superiority, which mainly profits government contractors, women are saying no, no to social service cutbacks, no to the arms race, no to military interventions, No to racism, no to violence against women. The Seneca Army Depot was chosen as a site for this no saying because of its long history of women's resistance to war, and injustice. And because the Seneca Army Depot is the storage site of nuclear weapons bound for Europe, and the neutron bomb, and other assorted weapons of mass destruction. This is the little town of Romulus, where the depot the main gate is located about one and a half miles from the encampment land. The depo itself takes up 11,000 acres or 4% of beautiful Seneca County, which is mostly an agricultural area 98% White, about 9000 families about 12% unemployment at the time the encampment began.

Unknown Speaker  06:16
This as you go from Romulus, past the depot, you go past all this ugliness. And then you finally come to the beautiful encampment itself on 52 acres of farmland which were purchased in the spring of 83. For $37,500 Mostly came in small contributions from all over. This is the front of the house. I'm going to try to give you a quick tour of the encampment and then hit the high points of what happened during one weekend. During the summer, you can see us out of Central America, everything is connected on the sign in the front, the front of the house, it was the area where men were invited to be there was always a lot of activities with children and so on. When you arrived at the encampment, you were encouraged to sign up at non registration, where you were asked to contribute $7 a day for expenses and three hours a day to the running of the encampment becoming part of a work Web. Because really everything happened on the energy of the women who came there. And there was a broad range of politics and a diversity of people who came there. But basic was a commitment to respect others and to be non violent. And the processes that were used are those traditionally emphasized by the women's movement shared decision making by consensus, non hierarchical structures, every woman has spokeswoman small groups for circling and focusing before decision making actions. And really the heart of the functioning of the encampment was the affinity group structure or a small group structure where women who came in affinity groups stayed in them women who didn't were encouraged to get in affinity groups, some of which were for civil disobedience actions with support people, and some of which were were for peacekeeping and, and other kinds of affinity groups were put together. Now. Obviously, that was some of the ideal of how the encampment would function. And I hope we get into a discussion about how well our vision was achieved on any number of issues, because there were many, many wonderful successes and some failures as we went on. But I'd like to just address briefly the issue of racism because women of color were not involved in the organizing efforts from the outset of the planning. And this had some bad results because little was done to ensure that women of color and poor and working class women could participate. This also, you know, could apply to women with children, disabled women, a lot was done and a lot wasn't done. For example, free transportation had been agreed upon, but never materialized. And little publicity was done in neighborhoods or among organizations where women of color would be most likely to see it. On the other hand, there were daily workshops on racism, often very good workshops, although not always well attended and late in the summer. The third world task force of the encampment did organize a special weekend and if I have time, I'd like to talk more about that later. If there was a lot of wonderful media shown along with the the workshops there was a lot of learning and sharing going on every day. And respect for the land was high on the agenda recycling, no missiles in the compost the pier. As I said there was child care on the encampment land, it was always something being built always something happening. This 900 feet of boardwalk was constructed to try to make it possible for all of us to walk around without tripping in cornrows. This pavilion was constructed. Just to give you an idea of the kind of love and care that went into everything. I'm going to show you a detail of this banner. This is so typical of the kind of caring that went into everything that women did at the encampment.

Unknown Speaker  11:01
We cooked food together, we ate together, we washed up in the sinks, which was incredible. Oh, my gosh, only five minutes left. I'm just gonna rip through this gang. Here's the encampment. Here's what happened. Okay, so why don't have five minutes. I'll never make it. Okay, what happened? There were daily action starting from July 4 to the beginning of the weekend of August 1, when something quite unexpected happened. When a group of 100 women were taking a walk celebrating Women's History from Waterloo, from Seneca Falls to the encampment, and they came to the small town of Waterloo, and were met by a screaming mob of people on the bridge, who were saying, let's see some blood and kill the commies kill the Jews killed the lessees. And the women did what nonviolent people do, they sat down to defuse the violence. The fact that these townspeople were screaming this, I took as a tribute to the fact that we had not altered ourselves or our approach to become acceptable. And the feminist peace movement is not the freeze movement. If everything is connected, then everything must be transformed. And when they were yelling, you know at us and of course, eventually the women were arrested, not the screaming mob. It was because they understood that women's power and energy are a threat to the patriarchal order. Whether or not we are communists, Jews, witches are lesbians. Those of us who are these things, of course, are less and less willing to fight for a single cause from the closet. They understood that and therefore had to take us away. Now this is a meeting, trying to figure out what we were going to do since 54 of our women and one of the town's women had been arrested. As it turned out, it was a very tense night. Because you know, there were there are always rumors that somebody is going to come and bust heads. And, you know, this was our high tech security. And eventually, though, we did get through this pence night without too much else going on. And we prepared for the planned big demonstration on the day of August 1 And there was non violence training, we learned that the Waterloo women would be held in jail for five days. So the preparations went on. While we tried to come to some kind of consensus about what we would do since the plan had not been to confront the county but to confront the Depo. And that evening ended with a a celebration of feminist reconnection in which women from various traditions, shared them with each other. And this is a Jewish rabbi who did some storytelling and this is the native woman who blessed the land for us. And while we were making our preparations, of course, the depot was making theirs. They upped their number of MPs from 250 to 700. From July 1 to December 14, there were 950 so called apprehensions at the depot, and they spent $1.7 million to deal with all of this Monday started early with the first affinity group to go over the fence at a remote point, like many many of the feminist peace movement actions that had a lot of ritual form in it they had made face masks and maintain their circle with the support people outside the fence and the civil disobedience inside the fence. People received ban and bar letters. Can you basically it said, Don't come back. This one the woman said her name was free Nicaragua. And they didn't believe that. So they made her a Jane Doe. In the meantime, some of the Waterloo women had escaped.

Unknown Speaker  15:26
I'm going to condense all of this, but the thing that's interesting about it is how, by sticking to our own processes, by not being intimidated by their threats, we could make the authorities both the county authorities and the Depo authorities except our process. They came into strip search these women in the jail after they escaped, and the women said no, we have to consult with each other before you can do this. And they did they called the energy out they finally went back and said to the matrons in the deputies, do you really think we're hiding these women up our vaginas, and it managed to cool them out enough so that they left without doing the strip search? Anyway, we gathered about a couple of miles from the depot and Sampson State Park to march bring things to transform the energy at the at the depot about 3000 women strong. We brought our own media was very well documented by us. Because we know we can't trust the mainstream media to bring the message. And we were met again by flag waving townspeople. You can say belly here because the the authorities were trying to halt our March stopped us from marching several times by saying they couldn't protect us from this group of people at the gate. But eventually the women said We came here to do this. And we're going to go on. state of emergency had been declared by the governor who mobilized deputies from 15 surrounding counties. And this is the little group that was waiting. And then the soldiers who had been quiet started running all around. Running, of course, is not one of the things that we don't do, because it gets everybody excited. We had been told that they couldn't lay this razor wire out. Without special machines. It turned out that the special machines were enlisted men with gloves, mostly black soldiers, who had to lay this down at the last moment. The women went ahead with a kind of condensed form of the scenario. We trace the our shadows, the outlines of our bodies on the on the asphalt to as a reminder that what happens when a nuclear bomb goes off is that you're vaporized. And all that is left is the mayor outline of yourself is what happened in Japan then that civil disobedience began. Women in their affinity groups, these women wove themselves together, went over the fence, very bravely, think the idea of you know that if you if you take one of us away 10 We'll come back. And I think that we've shown this in the spread of the movement in the Peace camps and the organizing that are going on. Now. This is some of the folks who wanted us to go home. Basically back to the kitchens seemed to be the idea. And this is what people were jumping into. I'm going to go very fast because I know I'm over my time. All kinds of support, some women decided to blockade the gate. And that night it rained and poured. But the next morning there was a new peace camp set up at this gate and the pinko dikes should camp with their comrades in Moscow. But the thing the thing I want you to notice here is that this lifesize doll which one affinity group had made to represent all the women who for whatever reason could not go over the fence is here is is strung up handcuffed. And this man is holding her leg up in this obscene gesture. And when I saw this, I understood in a flash in a way that I hadn't before how exactly the whole cycle of cycle of violence is connected about how the violence that we're talking about when we're talking Talking about rape and battering of women is the same violence, the same lack of respect for life that leads to military intervention and the arms race. And here are the women in the jail, they'd been moved to a school, people went there and vigils, again, the thing as a go through this that I would just like to say is that so much of what happened is that there was this contrast of

Unknown Speaker  20:28
a belief that things could change of hopeless of helpfulness of you know, in the face of despair, for example, this when we hung this banner in a tree, the townspeople tore it down, ran, ran away, with it, uh, tore it up through the pieces back, a woman sat down, sewed it back together, you know, laboriously, you know, that kind of perseverance, that kind of patience, eventually made a big impact. The fact that we consistently dialogued and spoke to the people who were yelling these horrible things at us made a difference. You know, at one of the vigils a man give this is just a small example, a man said to one of the women, well, what are you all going to do if you have to piss because we're basically, you know, blocked in? And she looked at him, and she said, I'm so glad that you're concerned about this question. You know, it's something that we've been thinking about, too, you know, and I mean, just like, that just gives you kind of idea of how it went. Here at the truck gate. Eventually, the soldiers came out and pushed everybody back. We're in the middle of the night and, and that night, eventually, toward the middle of the night, they arrested 26 of the black caterers, women were also arrested at the jail vigil. I'm getting near the end. The next day was the trial of the Waterloo 54 at the Seneca County, county fairgrounds. in Waterloo, again, you see the women circling the affinity groups trying to decide what to do. We had support supportive towns, women come out, we support your brag to walk peacefully through our village and so on. The women who had terrific solidarity had said they would not bail out. And they wanted to be tried together and they wanted a complete you know, exoneration return of their prints and pictures, and they weren't not cooperating at all. They were carried in, when they got in their motion was denied. So all the little affinity groups did whatever they had decided to do, and some started low humming and some started big singing, and so on. And so they had to clear the courtroom, which meant they had to carry out now, all the supportive women who had been in there. And we had so much solidarity by then that when they tried to bring these Jane DOE's out without even circling or anything, women automatically moved behind the car. And again, we made them understand our process, you know, that if they wanted us to leave, they were going to have to carry us all again away from behind the car. So they just dumped the steering go out on the ground and desperation and continue to carry in the carry the gin goes in one end, process them and dumped them out the other end American justice in action. And finally, they agreed they would hear the case all together, the Jane DOE's chosen their spokespersons by number, they happened to include Barbara damming, whom many of you know, and Noah has just had an operation for an illness. So I know, any energy that we could send her for healing would would be a good thing to do. But these women spoke so eloquently about why they had come that they want to complete victory, and not only got their demands met, but I think it was a turnaround in the county in terms of the respect of the townspeople and in terms of dialoguing with them and more pancake breakfasts and more going to the Rotary Club from then on and so on and talking about conversion trying to explain that we don't want people to lose their jobs that the military in fact generates fewer jobs than any other kind of spending. This as I said, later on, there was a weekend for women of color which included going to tear it Harriet Tubman is house and to her gravesite for a special ceremony.

Unknown Speaker  25:06
Later in October, women were starting to be a lot more explicit about the connections between all kinds of violence in our society. Women from the encampment as I said this is something that's not just happening in Seneca women came to take part in the 20th anniversary march for Martin Luther King for the the November 12, march against intervention and grenade in Central America and and I'm finally going to stop I had a big wind up and I'll skip it in the interest of time so thank you very much.

Unknown Speaker  26:31
Start now by introducing to ndarray Nicola McLachlan. Andrea is currently a tenured associate professor at Medgar Evers College of the City University of New York. Based on her professional interest of Black Studies and Women's Studies with an international as I mentioned, Dr. Nicole McLaughlin has been involved in the study research and teaching of women of color from 1973 to the present. She's conducted field research about women in the Caribbean, Asia, Middle East and Africa. She's taught and published on the subject and women presented papers on women's issues, and international women's conferences in the United States, Japan and Canada, and has conducted postdoctoral research on women at several universities as a fellow. In 1979. She was appointed the first woman dean of administration in the history of the City University of New York. Currently, Dr. Nicola McLaughlin, is the chief coordinator of the International resource network of women of African descent, which is an independent research organization. And she served as a member and board member of several women's organizations in journals. She is also a participant in a multiple year multicultural Women's Studies project, which is sponsored by the Fund for the improvement of post secondary education, to develop a national model for the incorporation of the study of women of color across the curriculum in institutions of higher learning. We're very glad and honored to have her with us. Thank you very much.

Unknown Speaker  28:16
Thank you, I just wanted to first say, tell did that I really enjoyed that presentation. And the spirit of it really reminded me to struggle at maker I could really feel it. Good morning friends. I'm pleased to be a member of this panel this morning, which is addressing in title and in content, the connections among feminism, anti racism and peace that must be made in a society and in a world community, where we are confronted with startling contradictions the causes of which must be subjected to informed discussion in order to contribute to the necessary resistance of poor women, working women, and third world women in a qualitative fashion. My friends, 1983 to the present, more than any other time in our history reflects the need for serious study and analysis of our social realities, and a need to recommit ourselves to the liberation of women and other oppressed peoples of the world with renewed vigor and courage. In addition to being a time of aggravated poverty, racism, sexism and militarism, it is a period of confusion where oppressors are touted as liberators, a time of disinformation when lies receive greater receptivity than truth, a time of hypocritical rhetoric. When the all powerful give lip service to democracy, peace and freedom and commit acts of injustice, war and terror, a time of slick imagery, where the mass media

Unknown Speaker  29:50
tout or make palatable racism, sexism and economic exploitation and give those phenomena merit as heroic patriotic can simply necessary and a time of new pluralism that provides social and economic mobility to individuals from among oppressed groups as the best singer or best athlete or best rider, the most beautiful elected officials appointed officers members of the corporate management, but hold classes remain locked out, and victims of an absolute increase in poverty. And the nature of these times clearly poses challenges to the women's movement, the black liberation movement and the peace movement, as we address the issues of feminism, anti racism and peace in our struggles to create a world order which advances the human condition in general, and the condition of women in particular the focus of this conference, while women of the world community have different concerns based upon the specific conditions of their particular social circumstances, I submit to you that the effectiveness of the women's movement, the black liberation movement, and the peace movement in the 80s and beyond, will largely depend upon the ability of these movements to deal with the overriding concerns of women of color, learning about learning from and supporting the struggles of women of color globally, as well as the necessary and inevitable assumption of leadership roles by women of color in all of these movements. Indeed, the nature of these times mandates that the women's movement can no longer minimize the social fact of racism, as much as the black liberation movement can no longer superficially address sexism, as much as the peace movement can no longer avoid the horrendous reality of imperialism. If these movements are to be viable vehicles for social change in the present and the future. There is no doubt that, that women's oppression is worldwide, and patterns of exploitation of women of color have made racism sexism, imperialism, and militarism, inseparable issues in the struggles of resistance to survive, and against social injustice, as well as in the quest for lasting peace. At the 1980 World Conference for women in Copenhagen, the second of three world conferences in this United Nations decades for women, the following facts recited, women and girls are half of the world's population, do two thirds of the world's work ours receive a 10th of the world's income and own less than a 100th of the world's property. And I want to repeat that women and girls are half of the world's population, do two thirds of the world's work ours receive a 10th of the world's income and own less than 100 of the world's property. Clearly, material impoverishment is the unity of circumstance of the majority of the world's women who are poor women who are working women who are women of color. Even in a technological era, the phenomenon of poverty plagues the world community, including underdeveloped as well as developed societies. Many social theorists would have us believe that poverty is an everlasting fact of like life, like the birds and the bees, or the plight of inferior peoples, only to be alleviated by Western Western altruism. But the unmitigated truth is that in today's world, poverty is a fact of oppression, primarily imperialism, meaning the economic exploitation of the land, labor and resources of the majority of the world peoples for the benefit of a minority, aided by institutional racism and sexism and militarism. If we confront this matter squarely certainly, it is evident that the social realities of hunger, lack of decent housing, illiteracy, high infant mortality rate, and manifestations of poverty have provided the objective premises for yet other manifestations of so social deprivation, including crime, social unrest, and Civil War from which few nations have escaped. And if we honestly ask the question of who is the most intensely affected by poverty? The answer is women of color every time every time because of how race, gender and economic class intersect to define their our social experiences. And it is the struggle of resistance of women of color against this oppression and within the context of national struggle that has compelled the United States and other nations Under its influence to escalate militarism, war, terror and the threat of violence, to maintain the balance of power and their favor to protect the privileges they accrue off the backs of those who they oppress. Clearly, the fact that there has been approximately 300 armed conflicts in the world since 1945 evidences that the world that world peace is one of the foremost critical issues of our time. And the attendant realities of this social history, inform us that world peace is unalterably linked to economic factors and to the condition of women. For those of us groping to comprehend, our turbulent present, and the whys of wars in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the wherefores of assassination, coos and countless demonstrations in the Third World and elsewhere, elsewhere, and the How comes of urban rebellions in such places as Miami, Florida, and Nashville, Tennessee in the 80s. It is important to recognize that the condition of material impoverishment is the tragic legacy of historical oppression for the aims of imperialism, and through the means of militarism, including genocide, whereby acts are committed with intent to destroy in whole or in part, a national ethnic, racial or religious group, such as the annihilation of countless Indian or Native American nations and the dispossession and consignment of Indian survivors to reservations, what I call the first ban to sands slavery, whereby hundreds of millions of able bodied peoples of African descent were forcibly removed from the African continent to serve as free labor for for their oppressors also resulting in the under development of the African continent. Colonialism, whereby the lands of peoples of color were and continue to be carved up irrespective of culture, but convenient to the exploitation of natural resources, and the labor of the indigenous peoples of the land for the benefit of the interests of non native classes. Puerto Rico being a case in point, Neo colonialism, where puppet regimes backed by the United States and other nations are installed to ensure domination of the economies of nations in Asia, Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America, with El Salvador and Central America, Argentina and South America and Zambia in Africa being representative of this type phenomenon, racism and sexism whereby peoples of color and poor and working women, based upon the myths of race, and the biological fact of gender are subjugated by policies and practices, which harm the mentally, emotionally spiritually and physically, an economic class, whereby the distribution of the world's resources has created international underclasses of peoples of color and women directly attributable to policies of production and distribution of wealth of transnational corporate interests in order to ensure their economic profit. And finally, repression, whereby governments employ dictum legislation, intrigue, and oftentimes violence, to deny the democratic rights of their citizenry in order to maintain patterns of exploitation and oppression. These circumstances, the faces of imperialism, in ever present partnership with militarism, comprise the circumstances of oppression and exploitation, which define and have defined the wretched social, economic and political realities of peoples of color. And I cite these circumstances to issue any threads of of liberalism and distortions of Western thought, which rationalize material impoverishment as a natural fact. And D today, the face of imperialism has intense has intensified with transnational corporate interests has replaced monopoly capitalist expansion. We're institutionalized racism, sexism have supplanting in most areas of the world legislated discrimination, and we're new centers of capitalism in the underdeveloped nations of the world have largely replaced colonialism. And I lay these concerns on the table because any viable conception of feminism or conception of peace must address the circumstances for there can be no genuine equality of the sexes, no genuine peace without social justice. It is imperative that conceptions of feminism and peace address imperialism as well as the escalating militarism of this nation and others who engage in covert and overt activity to destabilize the legitimate government of Nicaragua mining ports and endangering international navigation, who fly reconnaissance missions in support of El Salvador and death squads that wantonly murdered the people of that nation. And who sell and export chemical compounds for the manufacture of Iraqi mustard and nerve gas used against the Iranian people who supply aid to the repressive regimes of Marcos in the Philippines and Pinochet in Chile, who use the guise of ensuring World Peace to deploy troops in Lebanon, to frustrate self determination of the Lebanese people who invade sovereign nations such as Grenada under the pretext of restoring democracy, who hold Haitian refugees in concentration camps in Miami, Florida, who used Israel Israeli government as a go between to supply arms to the racist and minority government of South Africa to buttress this barbaric regime, who sell carcinogenic food products and baby formula banned in the United States to the Caribbean, Africa, Asia and Latin America, who Thai food aid legislation to feed 150 million people and 24 drought stricken African nations to a controversial $93 million writer for military assistance to El Salvador, who finance advertise and conduct campaigns of sterilization abuse in Puerto Rico and in the domestic communities of peoples of color in the United States, who refuse to have dialogue with the United Nations recognized representatives of the Palestinian people who seek to discredit and undermine the governments of Cuba, Angola, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Vietnam, China, as quote unquote communist ministers, who violate international law of the United Nations, the Charters of the regional bodies, such as the Organization of American States and the organization of Eastern Caribbean States, and even the legislation of their own nations. The War Powers Act in their activities in the Caribbean, Central America and the Middle East, and who in general denied peoples of color, social, political and economic liberation or human rights. It seems clear to people of color that beginning with the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Nagasaki, and Americans supported aggression in Vietnam, Korea and the Congo, violence against non white nations appears to be official US policy, and an extension of imperialist designs initiated by European nations 500 years ago. The events that I just cited should crystallize why other cultures respond negatively to this government. Why representatives of other nations are in constant conflict with the representatives of the United States government at the United Nations, why these nations of the third world have no desire to model themselves after the societies of the West, why people of color around the world are in a perpetual state of resistance against many of the policies and practices of the developed nations. So certainly, the ongoing resistance of women of color is primarily focus at the facts of poverty and racist genocide, which define the realities of women of color worldwide. Women of Color today, by and large are not talking about equality or peace, independent of talking about social justice. Clearly conceptions of feminism and peace must move beyond the symptoms of inequality and war, and deal with the causes of exploitation and oppression. The same causes which define women of color status as the least educated, least paid, least employed, and among the most intensely exploited victims of war, violence and terror and thwarting their quest for self determination. The conception of feminism today must not simply be won for socio economic and political equality. But once the socio economic and political liberation, which requires the defeat of imperialism, a conception of feminism, which addresses the tools of colonialism, Neo colonialism, racism, sexism, economic class repression, and militarism, which contribute to the exploitation of our lands, the natural resources, and the peoples of those lands, a conception of feminism that is broader than sex oppression, but deals with the interconnectedness of the variables of race, gender, and class, and the fundamental similarities between the causes of male and female poverty in an international system that has generated an international working class to supply cheap labor, domestic service and serve as a reserve workforce. realities not reflected in the limited exact analysis of the theory of feminization of poverty, for example, a conception of feminism that makes a distinction between the political class interests of the poor and working women and those of the petty bourgeoisie and ruling class women such as Margaret Thatcher, Eugenia Charles and Nancy Reagan. A conception In a feminism that requires feminists to try to influence their country's policies to eliminate Neo colonialism and the activities of multinational corporations, which not only exploit the resources of the developing countries, but also thrive on the cheap labor of women and children, a conception of feminism that respects the fact that culture, culture defines belief systems morality, customs, laws, EDM, aesthetics, social institutions and systems of social stratification, and that the social realities of any people cannot be comprehended independent of the dimension of culture, a conception of feminism that encourages action oriented programs of research to address the concerns of disease, inadequate housing, illiteracy, and the equal distribution of the world's wealth, rather than self serving approaches of simple academic curiosity. A conception of feminism whose analysis of the condition of women worldwide make the connection between economic and political under development and the oppressive practices of apartheid genocide, and expansionism in all its forms a conception of feminism, which is a proponent of equality, by advocating and practicing the inclusion of women of color in the study, research and teaching of their own realities, thereby promoting equality. Women of colors conception of feminism is one that seeks to embrace the struggles for nationhood, and sisterhood. And that means in addition to reproductive control as as women, we are concerned with sterilization abuse practice against non white peoples. In addition to prenatal care, we are concerned about inadequate health care and disease which afflicts the populace of our societies. In addition to affirmative action for women. We are concerned about the prevalence of illiteracy in our societies and communities. While we acknowledge that we are the victims of the personal sexism of poor and working males of color, we are acutely aware that our people are victims of institutionalized racism and sexism. Due to the state apparatuses, which support imperialism and militarism. Our struggle as women is not separate from our stroke, from our struggles of our peoples. And for most of us, women's struggle, and people's struggles are one in the same. Likewise, women of color is concept of peace is double age, and includes in into social injustice as well as militarism. Quiet injustice is not a qualitative concept of peace. And I was pleased to see in the end jibs slideshow, the sign saying cineca sign for future of peace and justice, a conception of peace that is viable, must be broader than civil rights of the people of a nation, but one that advocates total social transformation, requiring the defeat of imperialism and the necessary restoration of human rights for all peoples. The Peace Movement cannot simply deal with responding to military war, or the threat of nuclear war is broad and to respond to human war, the peace movement must be broadened to understand that there is no real peace. As long as the human wars of poverty and racist genocide are waged against peoples of color, the peace movement must be broadened to comprehend that there is no real peace. While there is no freedom. In South Africa, for example, the majority population will not cannot stand for quiet injustice, the peace movement must be broadened to appreciate that the death and injury of non white peoples by conventional arms is just as much a priority as nuclear proliferation. And the peace movement must be broadened to provide explanations on why the United States Congress has to keep checking to see if Reagan violated the War Powers Act. In the case of Lebanon, in the case of Grenada, in the case of Nicaragua, and why Reagan can ignore the United States Congress's action and send aid to El Salvador anyway, in other words, explain who is really running the nation.

Unknown Speaker  49:24
So these become the challenges that all nations and all peoples must deal with. Just put my notes and I'll just conclude the peace movement must broaden to explain why socialism is a threat to capitalism. And what are the conflicting interests of the world's majority versus an international minority? The peace movement must be brought in to explain the rip off in the guise of democracy and expose As the whys of the opposition to advances in housing, education, health care, and that some non white nations are making, all movements must grow with the times and meet the challenges of the day will be doomed to frustration and inevitable disintegration. Women of color have addressed the interconnectedness of the variables of race, class and gender, and our struggles of resistance. This is the challenge to Western feminism and the peace movement to move beyond the symptoms of inequality and war and deal with the causes. The realities of women of color, and indeed the world are defined by the Western inspired realities of male dominance and women's subordinates. As much as they are defined by European development in third world under development, as much as they are defined by white skin privilege, and race discrimination or national oppression resulting from imperialism and militarism. In the end, more and more women of color have accepted leadership in waging the struggle of resistance. For we recognize that the struggle for peace, the struggle for women's rights, indeed complete social, political and economic liberation, for ourselves and for our people. And yes, for other women, poor and working women must be based upon the demands of the most intensely exploited and oppressed women of color. And we recognize the truth of the words of freedom fighter, Assata Shakur, who said, it is our duty to fight for our freedom, we have nothing to lose, but our chains, thank you.

Unknown Speaker  51:40
Know, sabe has been working on his issues as an issue of mothers and the power of mothers to mobilize for change. She's a professor in philosophy at the New School seminar College. We're very glad to have you with us. I'm sorry, I was so rushed.

Unknown Speaker  52:00
I'm going to speak about something just I believe, to be quite specific, and really quite modest, although I know it generates a lot of controversy. And that is that mothers have a distinctive role to play in peace movements. And in the development of a non violent world. The expression of maternal values is only one part of a general feminist peace politics that Jeb and Nesta are talking about. I believe that the independent women's peace movements of Seneca and Greenham are the most hopeful, optimistic things around. But it's not the only peace movement that I think that mothers can play a part in.

Unknown Speaker  52:44
I believe that mothers and Mother identified people can bring up maternal perspective to almost any place that they gather, so long as they are willing to endorse that perspective, and to act out of it. Now, this is a controversial view. I know because I've been speaking around harder for me to believe. And one of the problems is that women's distinctive peacefulness is under attack, if you know if you've read off our backs recently, for example. And then if it turns out to be mother's peacefulness, this only makes things worse, it's as if the dirty secret has finally come out. I'm not going to talk particularly about that. I think Nesta will do it more. But I would like to say in the context in which I talk about Mother's peacefulness has to do with what I consider the overwhelming urgency and centrality of the peace issue itself. Now, I'm not talking here primarily about the fact that I believe it's more than likely that we will all everyone in this room be killed in a nuclear war. I do believe that, but that's not really what primary primarily moves me. But I'm primarily moved by in a nuclear way, is the terror that these weapons inflict right now, on our citizens, young and very old, on the cost that they make to our citizens in every way that Andre was just now talking about. I am also aware, the more I study war, have the absolute inextricable connection between nuclear and conventional war in strategy and battle plan and in the fantasies of the men who are planning wars and some of the women who are planning these wars. I also believe the more I know about it, the conventional violence is itself horrible beyond toleration, whether it's a napalm bomb, or simply a firestorm that you put in somebody's village or city. And even I believe that the counter violence the legitimate, legitimate and justified counter violence that people must engage in and the third world against our US policies, even that I believe has its costs for people who have to engage in it. I don't think from what I've known in the peace movement, and in my sort of inactive or even cerebral part in it. I don't think that one engages in the peace movement, one is less sensitive to other kinds of violence. The opposite is the case. When you come to realize why it is You care so deeply, that lives are being wasted, deliberately wasted, you see, and how they're wasted in many, many kinds of way of which racism, poverty, are two of the primary examples and absolutely central to any mother's life who suffers from them. In addition, I believe that militarists anti militarist peace movement, people know that as they fight militarism and struggle to invent nonviolent alternatives, that they must make fighting against racism, part of their struggle. It's not only that victims of racism are primarily and always especially victims of war. They are as soldiers as we go into war as civilians who are suffering in the poorest parts of the cities bombed. They're especially victims if they are captured the soldiers. And they are especially victims that they are conquered as civilians is the victims of racism, who are especially killable, and especially breakable. It's also true that the military depends deeply upon our acceptance of racism. It's because we accept that other people are killable, and killable. Because we are different, that good boys, and good women are able to kill them. Similarly, non violence, and its success depends upon our giving up, freeing ourselves of racism, because those who engage in non violence take it as their fundamental hope and faith that they can be seen as human beings, and that anybody they confront is changeable. And changeable, partly in response to their own courage and suffering, as we saw today, in Jeb slide. And it's also true, I'd say that, to that non violence has, it has developed, it has been principally the creation of people of color, in this country, and in Africa, and in India. And this seems to be entirely fitting. Now, let me get back to mother's, which I think is very controversial. It's because I believe that the struggle for peace is so absolutely urgent and so connected and necessarily connected to struggles against poverty and racism. That if it's true is I believe that there's a distinctive kind of peacefulness embedded in a maternal practice, that is a practice of a kind of work that a great variety of people ordinarily do in an heroic way, that if there is that potentiality, it must be utilized. Now, when I talk about mothers, I mean, a particular kind of work that people do. This is a social category. For me, I'm talking about the people who assume the primary responsibility of caring for children, and do a large proportion of the daily work for them, or do a large proportion of the work of getting good daycare centers, and other health care and whatever that will enable them and their children to live full lives. Now, because so many women have been mothers. And even more important, because so many mothers are women, I believe it is impossible, to separate conceptually, or practically the woman late from the maternal.

Unknown Speaker  57:59
And for that reason, and also because I want to honor the women who have done and still do the large majority of maternal work, I use the feminine pronoun when talking about mothers. But this does not mean that I think there's anything in a radically or inescapably female about being able to care for children or the vulnerable anywhere. Now, why is it? What is it about the peacefulness of mothers and I talk about this all the time, and when I'm told I have to talk very fast. I always, I always feel extremely militarist myself. And I started saying the two points and listen to two points of that, and pushing and so forth. I will do that anyway, and then just bear with me. Essentially, I believe that there are two components to the peacefulness of mothers that I'm talking about. One is the non violence already embedded in maternal practice, and the second is the maternal aversion to war. Now, by the non violence embedded in maternal practice, the fundamental fact I have in mind here is that mothers as mothers are in struggle in the world. This is enormously different depending upon social circumstances, personal oppression that comes from as an individual or as a member of group. But mothers typically are in struggle, and they have struggled from two positions both the position of the powerless and necessarily also of the powerful, mothers are powerless. They're powerless in relation to the world, to the nursery school teacher, to the pediatrician to the welfare worker to the Selective Service person, let alone the United States government, to everybody who tells the mother how her children are to be used and abused, what the how they're to be let in what services they can offer. Mothers are powerless, often in relation to the adults even living in their own home. And they are really powerless in relation to their children, whose wills and ambitions and desires they cannot control and often cannot even predict. But mothers are also powerful. They are physically larger than their children and able to destroy by them for many years, they're often enraged with the very children whom they can destroy. And their psychological power, as any daughter will tell you in a minute is immense, and often abused. Mothers then from the position of both powerless, and the powerful and alternatingly, one and the other, both struggle and teach their children to struggle, who are also ultimately powerless and powerful. Children are obviously powerless. But if you think a child isn't also powerful look at a four year old child picking on a two year old child. Now, there are two components, I think, to this nonviolent struggle of mothers, which I mentioned just very briefly, these are the two I think central components of non violence when it becomes public, to the first is the obligation to resist that is the obligation to resist violence inflicted upon your children, or violence which your children inflict upon themselves. If they become drug abusers, for example, or anorexic, or the violence, children will inflict upon their, upon each other, the cruel bully, for example, or simply the enraged and frustrated child who simply can't take it any longer. The second component of this resistance, the obligation to resist is the first component of this non violence with mothers. The second component is the renunciation of techniques of struggle, which lastingly damaged psychologically, physically or spiritually, the opponent one struggles against. Now, this is not mothers, I believe, engage in this renunciation of violence. This is not because they cannot imagine killing, they can imagine killing their own children. And I have asked women around who cannot ever imagine and have no desire to be a mother. I've said, Can you ever imagine killing, and they almost always say, yes, if I became a mother, I would kill, there are read not because they would kill their children, but because having children gives you a reason to kill, to kill those who hurt their children, your children. On the other hand, typically mothers do not kill. Typically they learn to fight and they fight daily, and they fight in another way. Now, I am not saying and this is fast, and I could say more about the thing. But I am not saying that mothers are that mothers are good, or that mothers always resist or that mothers are not violent. I am not saying any of those things. Violence is a constant temptation in maternal practice, and it is a frequent occurrence.

Unknown Speaker  1:02:31
acquiescence passivity, is a constant temptation and maternal practice, out of fear, out of intimidation, out of ignorance, or simply out of fatigue. A mother might acquiesce in the violence inflicted on her children, or in the violence that children inflict upon themselves. What is important to me is precisely not that mothers are good, but that they engage, and we engage in a kind of struggle, whose elements have a great deal to do with the ability to resist and to renounce violence simultaneously, which is what I take to be the task of the development of a peace movement. Now the second part of the renunciation or the peacefulness of mothers is much more familiar. That is that mothers, the work of mothers is undone by the work of war. I won't, I will just say very briefly what you should really hear, though, and here's it's gone through the centuries around the world. And it's been said, by many different mothers of many different colors and persuasions and national origins. But what's very clear is that mothers treasure lives, they treasure psyches, bodies and spirits, and they treasure those at great cost and a great effort because those bodies those lies, but spirits are at risk. And the military deliberately in dangers, all of these, and it does it because it believes it's right to do so. Now, obviously, mothers are militarist. Despite this opposition, no one is surprised that in every struggle on both sides of the battle lines from Nazi Germany to anywhere else, the best role you can think of mothers are supporting. Some mothers are supporting their sons and their lovers and their mates. But the militarism of mothers is perversely a source of hope. Because we have given our military we because we have played important roles in military strips, because we have done our part, we have an important kind of support that we can now withdraw. And I believe, by the way that the feminist politics combined with a non violence movement is the best single source of change for undermining mothers militarism. Mother's militarism is partly the result of what I call parochialism. And parochialism also limits the non violence of mothers as it moves into the larger world

Unknown Speaker  1:04:43
parochialism by this I mean the maternal thinking the thinking that arises out of maternal practice is inspired by particular loyalties to particular children and to the particular people who sustain those children and who those children live among. I do not know and I really do not know whether that means that mothers have a particular temptation to racism. It is extraordinarily difficult in the best of societies to move from my child, to your child, from my people, to your people. And in a deeply unjust society where mothers are divided against each other, it may be nearly impossible. But I have had experience of mothers resisting racism, that I am not telling you about the experience I have read about and which I admire, and by which I am deeply moved. That is where the mothers who are victims of racism resist it for their children, and for themselves. As a Gentile in this country, as a white person in this country. I have known racism from the perspective of the racist, I've had no choice. And I have seen mothers, particularly tempted to racism, yes. And I've also seen them develop particular kinds of opposition to racism, an opposition to racism built primarily on solidarity with other women, often with other women, and their maternal lives, and the caring for the lives of their children and the people, their children with them on. So I believe that mothers have, again, like the struggle with militarism, a precise control to play, not because they're good, but because they are tempted and because they are techniques that they've developed, we have developed for overcoming that temptation. Now, just a word about feminism. I don't believe and I don't understand why feminism seems some feminists seem so in opposition to this view I've presented, it seems to me as I said that feminism has an enormous amount to bring to the struggle of mothers for peace, to undermining racism, to making mothers self respective of their violence, and to allowing people especially about the attack on homophobia, to recognize the solidarity of women, which I think really is embedded in maternal practice. And if mothers become self consciously active, and resistance and non violence, they will become active in feminist struggles, as well as in peace struggles, the mother who, who struggles for daycare, is the beginning of feminist, just as a mother who struggles for any kind of struggle, I think, there are real dangers, and I don't, I'm not gonna talk about them, because I'm not gonna say what you can read about, I do realize the real dangers in old fashioned stereotypes. And in any suggestion, that any suggestion which I would never want to make, that all women should become mothers, I believe mothers should be, women should be able to come mothers when they want to, and only when they want to. And I agree with you says absolute important equal, it's when you want to, as well as only when you want to. But there is also a danger in the feminist movement, I think, in not looking and not being willing to look at maternal work. What is it that makes it so hard to look at the work that these people the caring work these people do? I think that says so many women have done the work because so many mothers of women are so many mothers of women, that to deny this work is also to deny women to despise labor and to despise care, which makes it easier to kill. I believe that the real limited powers of mothers are frightening, but that that fright is partly a fear of women's power. And the ability to deny the reality and the lies and the caring that goes on in a particular group of women's lives is going to make it easier to kill anybody anywhere. And if in the worst possible case, it turns out and this is the fear that there are some biological differences between men and women, which have something to do with the fact that more mothers, more women are mothers than men are mothers. Even so I think we will have to accept that difference. Because the inability to acknowledge face welcome and embrace difference, different bodies, different lives, is what makes it possible to kill and mutilate. And that's what the fight of races against racism and against militarism seems to be all about. It's about not killing and not mutilating anywhere.

Unknown Speaker  1:09:06
I'd like to say that in fact, because we started half an hour late, we're actually running on time, so maybe one of us can put our heart beats down a little bit. We will be late to lunch, obviously, but we did not did not start until a good half an hour. After I calmed down with fine this is Nestor King Nesta is amongst the founders of the woman's Pentagon action. She was amongst the people scuttling around at the Seneca women's precinct, Caitlin, trying to get people into affinity groups wandering through the mud, trying to get it all to him. She has written a piece about the Seneca woman's piece and Katelyn in the recent issue of icon which I recommend to everybody. And yeah, you're here thank you

Unknown Speaker  1:09:50
think there's no this isn't this is this amplifying? I think There's no issue for any of us that's more urgent than peace. But I think what we have to do I agree with a lot of what what Andrei said that we have to really begin to push this what we mean by peace and understand that and expand it, I think beyond what it's meant before. And I think that that's been, you know, part of the work of the feminist peace movement. And we live in really very dangerous times. And I think a lot of us who are feminists have moved from our feminism, not abandoning our feminism, to begin to take on issues of peace, of ecology of social justice of racism, all sorts of issues, and integrate these into our feminism to expand our feminism. And, um, you know, just in the last, in the last couple of weeks, you know, we see, I think all the things that endanger us and I think that are leading us into some situation, which is possible nuclear annihilation, but even if it isn't, even if it never happens, I mean, the amount of misery and pain waged on the world by warmaking all over the globe, is reason enough that we could be thoroughgoing anti militarist with our same politics, whether or not nuclear weapons even existed, you know, and I think that there's altogether too much emphasis on nuclear weapons. And in thinking about peace, politics, and developing peace strategies, I mean, in the last two weeks, for example, we we've seen the way that the military, the military is mentality at work. I mean, we find that Reagan and criticizing the manufacturing use of nerve gas has decided that the way that this manufacturer that the best way to stop this manufacturing use of nerve gas is to build up the stockpiles in the United States so that we're in a bargaining position so that we can then get get people get other people to stop production of this nerve gas. And that's the same kind of the same kind of thinking that's gone into the arms race, and into the development of Evermore horrendous technologies for death. We also see the mining of the Nicaraguan harbors, you know, which none of us knew about which has been condemned by Congress, although not with any real teeth. I mean, they could have decided to cut off the font. So they did make a stand, but they didn't make it stick in the way that they even could have. And also, we see the the, the taking the cruise missiles have have gone to England, they are Greenham, they're being taken around the British countryside. There's a lot of resistance to that everywhere they go, they're being followed, people are lying down in front of them, it's turning out not to be nearly so easy to drive those missiles out of the gates and drive them around in some sort of test mission as they plan. And we see lots of different kinds of things. I think that really heighten the danger. And to me, I don't mean to say that the nuclear issue is an important because if there's a silver lining in a way to the nuclear issue, it's the potentially universalize as the effects of militarism. I mean, the nuclear war cannot be fought in a limited way just against people of color far away from the the makers of the war. And I think that in that sense, it makes peace, everyone's issue and in the interests of everyone. But it's been the particular job, I think we've taken it on as our own job of the feminist anti militarist movement to broaden the issue of peace beyond nuclear weapons, and to demonstrate sometimes bodily, the interconnections of systems of domination and violence. Um, in my experience in the peace movement, the feminist peace movement has been that it's, it's that we are an increasingly internationalist movement and that the meaning of this word, and this concept has for different ones of us differs depending on where are we located in the globe, depending on our own life experience.

Unknown Speaker  1:13:59
And I think the twin issues of peace and the recognition of our common oppression as women has the potential to bring us together by connecting issues and respecting these differences. Feminism demands that we move from our own authentic center of experience and make these connections. And I think we all we come as women from different centers of experience, racially, culturally, religiously, spiritually, but there are times I think, when that authentic center of experience converges, and I'm not talking about guilt politics, I'm talking about everybody moving from our own knowledge of our own oppression as women and beginning to make these connections and see these things as is as really inseparable. Now, there won't be a peaceful world there won't be as feminist world that isn't also an anti racist world. And I entered to really come to believe this, I think and to see this and to make these connections theoretically, practically, is what we're trying to do. And I had an interesting experience when I when I went through to Greenham Common that I think sort of sort of ill illustrates this, I visited Greenham in the fall. And when I when I was traveling, for the first time, really, I was traveling in a car with a woman from Japan, who was active in the feminist movement in the peace movement in Japan and a woman from India, who did not call herself a feminist, she felt that she was the key, she felt that there had been there has been in western feminism, a distinction between being for women and being a feminist. And, you know, she was really, she really in her work is emphasized issues of poverty of racism, and so forth, and was wary about how feminists think about these issues, or whether these issues have taken a central enough place and feminism. And we were talking about all these things, and we were talking about the Greenham action, and I was, you know, we were going on about what was happening there, and we had been sort of in a circle the day before, and, you know, it's, it's, um, it was a, it was a long trip, we sort of talked through all kinds of things, I learned an enormous amount on that trip. And I was quite a lot, because I was trying to drive an American car on the wrong side of the road. So I remember the whole experience very well. And I remember listening a lot, you know, and when we, and we didn't know each other that well, and we've come from really different places, you know, and as an American, I especially felt, you know, in that situation, I felt being in England, and hearing about and feeling the effects of US imperialism, and the role of the United States around the world, you know, you just get this increasing feeling as a white American, you know, this, of responsibility, guilt, nothing's enough, you know, what can you do? You know, how can our struggle be right? How can it be enough? How can you know, what are we doing about this? And, and when we arrived agreement, when there was we had a very, it was, our arrival was really sort of interesting, because just as we sort of pulled around, it was at dusk, and one of the evictions that was taking place that took place, that takes place at Green, um, you know, every day, you know, maybe several times a day was taking place at one of the gates. And we stopped the car, and we said, you know, sort of what's happening, there were all these British military people standing around and spotlights on these women, and there was a big dumpster, they were trying to throw all their things in and so forth. And we, so we encountered this, this, this, this eviction, which turned out to be a daily event in the lives of these military people and these women, and it was not without its push pull. I mean, that's something that people should understand about nonviolent direct resistance. I mean, it is not a passive process. It's a very active militant process. And

Unknown Speaker  1:17:39
so we all began, I think, in that moment, we all sort of having come from very different places, and having talked about things in different ways. And having talked about the peace movement, is this enough is, how are we doing this? You know, what is peace mean, for women from Japan? What does it mean for women from India? What does it mean for Western women, we sort of saw the same array of military poop of British soldiers and military police, you know, who'd plundered Ireland, India, Africa, and all these places, trying to take these tents away, you know, and the amount of sort of gunpowder and manpower and the rest they had against these women was just astounding. So we all immediately began to help them, you know, just sort of plugged right into this and began to help them with their eviction, you know, and what they said, you know, looking especially at the Japanese woman and the Indian woman, they said, Oh, well, we haven't seen you around here, you're immediately recognizable, you know? And Are you new here? You know, and, and the woman from India said, Yes, We're new here, we're here. But we're now part of this. And I think it was clear in that moment, in a way what, how our interests and they experience and does converge around this issue and how we are up against some of the same things, you know, and that, that our challenge is really to make these connections and to to make that clear, and to sustain and, and I think that, that I work with the work that in the kind of ongoing dialogue that people that I work with have been engaging in with Central American women, has also brought us to some of the same places. It's an ongoing process. And I want to emphasize that about everything I'm talking about. This is an ongoing process. We're just trying to begin to do this work. And I think that I want to talk about what I call a feminist piece sensibility. And I think that that's a better way to understand it almost than even a feminist piece theory or feminist peace, politics. And women have mobilized for peace and in in large numbers, as women and as feminists and there is a difference. And women's peace camps I think are centers of resistance of all kinds. And peace camp, I think is almost a shortcut way of saying you know, these these, these are these encampments have been made have been made against militarism. had been made and installations of violence, but they really represent all kinds of things and I think represented a holistic perspective. And green and women, for example, and we're gonna have someone from if we have time from Grantham, at least speak to us for about five minutes about what's going on there. Since there's been all this stuff in the news that the green room is over, and it's evicted. And this isn't true. And we're going to hear about that have, you know, as a result of their

Unknown Speaker  1:20:31
sorry. It says fine. Grain and women had been have as a result, and I think this is true. For those of us who've worked in the women's Pentagon action, who have become active around peace issues, you know, that this might be the first connection that some women make, as mothers, maybe if they're privileged white Americans, this may be the first issue that suddenly scared them to death and made them see that they have a stake in this whole worldwide issue. And I think it's our responsibility to broaden that up in there and make people see the depth and complexity of this issue, you know, along the lines of what Andre was talking about. And I think that that the green and women have been involved in involved as a result of their work and prison reform work, anti apartheid work. And their squatting at the camp has led to the enfranchisement of previously disenfranchised people, gypsies and others who had no didn't own property had no sort of recognized address. So there are all sorts of what you might call spin offs. And it takes you all sorts of places when you enter into a process of resistance. It's not a clean, sanitary single issue, possibility, it really isn't. And, you know, I think that's very good. And that's very healthy and feminist peace, politics, demand and interconnection of issues. And I think for us, we talk about patriarchy. But I think for us that this word has come to be almost a metaphor for a whole interlocking complexity of of oppressions. And I think I don't, anymore, in my mind prioritize about what is primary race, sex class, I think that these all add together and a whole lot of other things do. And so I think that, you know, there are no in a way prioritizing of issues and that we have to sort of take on the whole thing in a way. And that's both the difficulty and the promise, you know, the radical promise of what we're trying to do, and I don't think we see ourselves as a Vanguard, or that we even particularly, you know, I don't even particularly believe in Vanguard, I believe in that as a shared perspective, and that there are all sorts of ways to work toward the same goals. And I think that we come out I think that feminists piece politics, parent, that there there are, there's a trend in feminism, beyond what I think are traditional white women's issues, or the kind of definition of feminism that came out of the late 60s, I think there's a trend to toward broadening that on. And there's also I think white women finally have stopped universalizing our point of view or saying this is women's experience, this is women's oppression, this is what feminism is. And I think that the feminist movement of women of color, which is sometimes which has been called by some women of color, a womanist movement, I think is incorporated in a way, some of the ideas of of relating and connecting to, and drawing on traditional women's strength and power and transformational knowledge and values, you know, and I am not being a biological determinist in any way. But I think we do have a certain lived experience, which gives us a different point of view. I mean, this is a fragile thing. It doesn't it isn't everything. I think also that feminism has been right to react against, you know, the kind of definition of women's roles or the forcing of women into certain behaviors and assumptions about women based on gender. But I think that the the feminist peace movement, and the Third World Women's Movement have really pushed in the same kind of direction of the insistence of interconnection, of issues of a book feminism being a worldview, that that has to be broadened. And that that's that that's, that's really a direction that we have to go in. And I know that's a direction that's resisted by some other women too. And I hope in discussion that we can that we can talk about that about whether we should incorporate all sorts of issues, especially piece that's controversial,

Unknown Speaker  1:24:37
into a feminist perspective. So I think that also in thinking about ourselves as Americans that we have special responsibilities and possibilities, and I think, you know, I'm speaking here as a white American, and I've tried to really think through what what these are and I think that we live at the point of origin of much of the military violence in the world today. And I think the ethnocentrism and racism of white Americans is really a precondition for American global plunder. And I think that we've seen that time and time again, you know, and our taxes pay for it, our culture glorifies it, and a few of our most powerful white men profit economically from it. And I think what we have to do is get to the root of the problem. Feminism in a way, as we approach peace, I think we take our feminist kind of trust in our consciousness raising process and moving from our experience of our lives, and the value we place on transforming our daily lives to the issue of peace. And that we have to do that as well understand peace at that level, as well as understanding the political, the issues of political and economic power structures, and changing policy, and so on and so forth. And I think this has led me and a lot of American feminists who have taken up the issue of peace and began to think about that as a feminist issue to pacifism. And I'm gonna say this as a kind of pacifism with an edge. This is not passivity, this is militant nonviolent action. And I think I want to say a few things about pacifism, because I think this is also something that that isn't, isn't necessarily well understood, or that we all need to work on. And I'm really just thinking about this myself. So pacifist, but there are a few things that make sense to me, and pacifism from coming out of this analysis and mainly for namely, that there is a recognition of the interconnection of means and ends. And I also think that some that a lot of people think that nonviolent direct action or non violent action, at least, is the only way to go in this country at this time, because it's just the only practical thing. I mean, no, annihilate us if we really try anything else. But that's really not the only reason, I think we have a possibility of engaging in that kind of action. And you know that that's a certainly a more desirable way to go about resistance. It's less damaging to the people who take part in it, it holds out some hope for the people that were resisting against. And I think there's also the second point I want to say something about and that it allows us to make contain that interconnection of means and ends that feminists has been so important to feminism. I also think that the pacifism involves a basic tenet of pacifism is an opposition to objectification in all its forms. And this kind of objectification. objectification is necessary to racism, anti sexism, anti semitism, sexism, and more. And I think that that's where direct action comes in direct action is not only civil disobedience, it's taking certain sorts of direct actions in your life, you know, to insist on your own humanity, to allow for the humanity of others, but at the same time, to not allow yourself to be fucked over. Um, and so I think that's where, you know, at the encampment, for example, you see enormous attention paid to the land, to the way people interact a process to all those things, I mean, up to the point that some people felt even tortured by it, you know, and that it was, you know, endless meetings. I

Unknown Speaker  1:28:13
mean, it's not that easy, it isn't that sweet. It's difficult people get angry. It's, it's, it's a real struggle, um, and also, the recognition of the self and the other. This is another basic tenet of pacifism, that I think that we feminists have taken on in our piece politics is the recognition of the self and the other and the other in the self. And the refusal to make anyone else into an other to engage in this kind of objectification or to be another ourselves. And both of those things are equal parts of this. And I think this the consciousness raising format is based on this principle, that we're in a way we're going to talk to each other until we understand each other, we recognize our differences. You know, we keep going, we're also going to engage in political struggle while we talk to each other. And I think that this that without realizing it, that there are certain parallels and feminist thinking and pacifist thinking. And the pacifism is not tested. It demands militant courageous, nonviolent opposition and active work to create a non violent world. And then the last thing is that cultural change must proceed with structural and political change that one is not more important than the other that there's no no I base superstructure distinction. And I think that that's when we saw you know, in a situation like Waterloo that a lot of the women had were wearing banners, which made the connection you know, Pete, this was an anti nuclear issue, but the point of this walk, which was confronted by angry racist, of some angry racist townspeople, that they that was it that I think that was more an anti feminist demonstration than it was a pro militarist, women's tration you know, and it was a resistance to the connection of all these issues of the interjection of you know, I am a Jewish lesbian, and I'm against war. And I'm making these connections and statements about racism and Sojourner Truth and Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. And also all these independent, powerful strong women coming marching down the street, you know, I think that that that the that we shouldn't underestimate that and but I also think we shouldn't concede those connections in the name of expediency, we should narrow our issues, you know, for so called wider constituency or to appeal to people that we have to maintain this radical kind of edge, and sense of connection of issues and sort of staying vigilant on every front. And I think also that feminism has taken this analysis one step further, that the, this kind of pacifist analysis in a way and I think this is something we have said to peace people, you know, all you you pass a fist, you know, you've got it, you've got to take this on and think about this. The Gender Socialization involved in the making of traditional Western men and women is integral to the perpetuation of militarism. And that if you're for peace, you've got to be for feminism. Um, all right. So anyway, I'm gonna just just wind up and that this, this politics of connectedness has pushed us to think about addressing racism, I think in several ways, and it's really pushed us toward a strongly anti imperialist perspective. And I think feminist is thinking about racism has too often left off with discussions of how to integrate the movement and address racist attitudes in the women's movement. And that's fine and good, but it's not sufficient. And I think we have to really think about the whole the position of the US globally imperialism third world revolutions and and poverty. The problem is, here's that racism doesn't begin or end in the women's movement. And so I think, Well, I'm just gonna stop you have more time after okay. I think that we've also had to track my when my when lesson it's and we've had to understand and support and figure out in a way how to support their revolutionary struggles against militarism, even when they when they involve counter violence, and this is something I think we should get into later on.