Unknown Speaker 00:01 This is the tape of misspelling FM in the seventh April 12 1980, there were chapters by Nancy Hartsock difference domination and community interference and man's workshop not Unknown Speaker 00:17 too bad, but it's hard to the list that I got said they were going to be Unknown Speaker 00:24 referencing the microphone, right? Well, the list I got said there was going to be seven people. Now, when I had, I mean, I had planned that, the way that I would start the workshop was we would go around the room, and everyone will say, what they thought they wanted to do in the workshop. And clearly, that's not going to be possible. But what I would like people to do is to sort of think, as I as I try to raise a set of issues about what really we can do. And what we can do here to try to try to think through issues a difference in domination in the women's movement. So I'll probably talk, I'm shooting to talk for about 20 minutes. And then to leave the rest of the time for discussion. And since we're starting late, we're gonna we're gonna try and tweak it. Unknown Speaker 01:18 Let me say a little bit about how I want to go about talking about domination women, keep in the back can hear me whenever I sort of get to raise your arms. I guess the first thing to say is that what I'm going to do is very much a kind of experiential, it's very similar effect to that because it this morning, for a while that she was beginning, I was afraid that she was going to give my talk for me, I would be left with nothing to say, fortunately. So it seems to me that I need to say just a bit about the experience about which I found because I was very surprised to hear the talk that she gave about Leslie as it is, I was surprised that in New York City in 1980, what she said needed to be said, I take it that she lives here, and she knows and I don't. So my experience is really in Baltimore, in Washington, DC. And in those cities, these kinds of things need much less to be said in particular in the context in which I was working. That is, since 1973, I was an editor of quest to feminist, which emerged out of a lesbian feminist separate. It was, of course, as many of you may read it, it was also anti capitalist, anti racist. And my experience in this group was to be the first and for a long time, the only heterosexual I learned a lot. So that's, that's the kind of experience out of which I want to talk to you. Now. Second, I want to say that, when I'm saying assumes that you know something about the history of the women's movement, and things that I may say, that are confusing, maybe we can talk about in the discussion, discussion part. And finally, I want to say that what what I'm presenting is something that I'm still very much thinking that I'm really not at all clear about where the end comes out. But let me begin by talking about what I what I think I'm doing in terms of doing feminist theory. Now, what I what I think we need to do here is to try to theorize our practice, that is to look back at the practice of the women's movement, around questions of difference, and to see what theory is embodied in our practice. That is, I begin from the position that our practice really embodies ideas and embodies ways of thinking about the world. And my contention is that whether or not we understood it at the time, and in fact, most times we don't understand it, there is in fact, a period contained in our actions. And so what the question that I want to raise is, what was the understanding of difference that was contained in our various practices as feminists and as a women's movement Unknown Speaker 04:12 over the last 10 years? Unknown Speaker 04:17 Well, to lay out the basic event, what I want to suggest is that there's a fundamental connection between difference in relation. This is not unique to the women's movement, but it has occurred and existed in you. Now, probably the most striking statement of this relation is a statement made by Ursula McQuinn, a science fiction writer, when she's talking about the role of alien science fiction, this is an extreme place to start. But in part because it's so extreme, I think the issue is what the wind says, is that the alien sexually racially culturally or socially different is alien can be helped or hatred, and our fear of may take the form of either hatred or reference. But the heart of the issue is, if you deny any affinity with another person or another kind of person, if you declare it to be wholly different from yourself, as men have done to women, as class has gone to class, as nation has automation, you may hate it, we may deify. For the either case, you have denied spiritual equality and attune in reality, you have made it into a thing to which the only possible relation is a powerful religion. And you have less faith in impoverished, your own reality. Now, this, it seems to me, it's the most extreme and stark statement of what different of the relationship differences and domination. And what I want to do now is to look at that kind of relation as its operated independence experience. And what I want to suggest is that our experience of difference and domination, and along with it, our understanding of power, have gone through several stages in our in our history as a movement, there was stage one, which I would, he's a very rough date. They're utterly my own experience. But the first stage I think, is from roughly to the forming of now, in the mid 60s, up to the beginning of the 60s. And this was a period I think of an attempted homogenization. This was a period in which we tried to create a kind of universality, one which was deemed to be there was a period in between ignored issues of power. Second, there was a period in which we attempted to destroy power differences by obliterating differences altogether. And this is a period that I think, culminated in the separatist wave of the 70s, the wave of separation first for men and heterosexual women, so avoiding avoiding those who had the power to dominate. And then I think there's a new phase that I have seen, at least in the activist women's movement in Baltimore, in Washington, a phase in which women are trying now to deal with differences, in which we are trying really to face differences of class, race and sexuality, and in which we are really trying to work with much broader groups of people. And I think that this this third phase is playing with it. Yet another understanding of power. That is, I think each phase here contains a very different understanding. And it seems to me that this third phase that we are now in trying to work with more and more people raises a new question for one, which I hope that this workshop can can discuss, and one about which I have a lot of conflicting feelings, that is the relationship means and ends in action. That is, we all used to say, what we want to do is to prefigure the new society, in our organizations, and looking at the history of the last 15 years, makes me wonder, to what extent that is possible. And to what extent even that ought to be possible. But is, it really is the question of to what extent do we want to preserve differences among us, in our organizations? That's the final question. I doubt we can do. What kind of society do we really want to create? Do we want a society in which all differences are individual differences? Do we want to preserve aspects of women's culture? Do we want to preserve aspects of that country? Unknown Speaker 08:37 So that's the that's the outline. So where do we begin? It seems to me that we need to begin with the issue of what are our strategies responses to, and most particularly, the thing that I want to point out is that capitalism and the capitalist patriarchy, that's a system that's absolutely riddled with contradictions. And I use that term in a very Marxist sense. That is, on the one hand, this is a system that uses our differences against us systematically. And I think we're very clear about a lot of the ways in which that happens. For a second, this is also a system that promises universal equality. This is a system that promises freedom, equality and democracy if you'd like. Now, I think that this is not simply a lie. It is a lie. But it's not simply a lie. That is, I think that the fact that it promises that gives us a place to stand to demand those things. And I think that we can, we can in fact, use that and have us. Well, in particular, this contradictory reality, I think has special meaning for women. That is, first of all, women have been systematically excluded from the social relations of capitalism. And we all have have read and talked about the sex and race segregated labor man It's the way in which black works your domestics until the mystique of the family all of this operates to say, as Ross Chesky. And others said this morning that class is a very different thing. So we are, we are, in some sense excluded capitalist relations of production. At the same time, obviously, we are being brought in. That is most of the new jobs that have been created over the last 15 or 20 years have been jobs for women, sex segregated jobs, but also for women. So we are increasingly drawn in. So, it seems to me that there are a variety of ways in which we're really pushed in both directions. And I think our strategy and tactics, as analysts, has really haven't really been responsive to our experience of this contradictory reality. That is, our position is defined by these very contradictory and opposing pressures. And these pressures, I would argue, are our assault most drastically by women whose lives are not protected by race class and hetero heterosexual. It's really, the women who have no male protection, who experienced these contradictions in extreme form. It seems to me that that's, that's in a sense, a position from which you can really see the contradictory requirements of capitalism. Now, I pointed out these contradictory tendencies, because I wanted to say that our strategy really has responded to both of these tendencies at different times. That is, at first, what we wanted was simply to make a dream. That is truthful, this is this is a statement about the National Organization of Women in the middle 60s, this is the the early civil rights, there was really a stress on achieving the policies for all people. And by and large, those of us who accepted that strategy had accepted the ruling class account of our social relations. And we simply wanted to make what we learned, the lessons learned. And we copy them in lots of ways, learning a lot from that experience, when we learned that this was a falsity of yourself, doesn't count. But in addition, one of the things that we have noticed that the universalistic strategy doesn't really question the fundamentals of New York. And that is, it doesn't really raise questions about how. Now, what we discovered, I think, with this universalistic strategy, is that we cannot really wish away our differences they remain. And if we try to have a universal strategy without thinking through issues, but what we find is that it's the white middle class women who are articulate, who have access to the media, who named the province for everyone. And how many of us have been in meetings where women got up and said, Why are there no third world women here? And when you think about what led up to those meetings, that's astonishing, is not that there are no black or curvier women there. What's astonishing is that we should ask the question, why they are. Unknown Speaker 13:24 So it seems to me that that was that was our first strategy. The black movement in the 60s, I think, was the was the first movement to discover that that universality was really false and unreal. And it's no accident that the Desplat Discovery took the form of an argument for black power. That is, it's no accident, that issues of power was fundamental to that move away from universality. But the discovery of difference was really connected to the notion of power, and to focus on power relations, and feminists, using and responding to the black model of the later 60s. We often took up a variety of their tactics, sometimes simply appropriating things wholesale, without really thinking through what was specific to women's situation. Indeed, we exploited the legitimacy of the black movement to try to give ourselves well, we begin to react to difference by say, differences need to domination. And what that means is that we can't work with people who are different from us. Now, indeed, our experience both within the movement, civil rights movement, and within the movement and in society at large told us that indeed, this was the case that differences didn't domination. difference was what defined lack of goodwill depression. difference was fun. fundamental to the segment of labor markets that ensured that women who worked for wages received only 60% of the wages. And that black men were very much confined to a single area of work. So what we did, then, as a response, as feminists did was we tried systematically to destroy Unknown Speaker 15:18 differences. Unknown Speaker 15:20 What that meant was, we created organizations that were extensions of our consciousness raising groups. Second, we opposed all leadership. Third, we insisted that all work be done collectively, and restructure process. Let me talk a little bit about how that works. And in a sense, I see this as reminding a lot of us have experienced that we were now women's centers in particular, in a variety of cities have functioned on a on a car. They've often been based on structures, personal politics, and they've been concerned about making a place where each person can feel comfortable and accepted. There's nothing wrong with that. Women senators in the past have posed structures in which individuals have positions of power. And decisions about the work to be done in the following year have often been taken meetings for anyone who showed up that night for the first time, had as much right to participate as those who had kept the centerboard from previous year. So second, let me remind us of of our opposition to leadership, and opposition that I think was really overwhelming to Christians. And still, I think, I think partly this came out of the strong influence of anarchist thought. But it came more immediately, I think, from our own desire to eliminate bureaucratic structures and immediacy. That is to eliminate the kind of differences in status and power that had led in our experience to domination. Now, some have argued that the opposition to leadership meant that any woman who was competent, who would accomplish things is likely to be trashed to being a leader. But feminists, I think were reacting in a way that was altogether to be expected to our experience of leadership in a male dominated experience of leaders who were also those who dominated leaders who are enemies, unresponsive, especially female members of the organization. And because we have been oppressed by leaders in these groups, we reacted by refusing to name leaders at all. Of course, the media went ahead and did it for us. But but the point, I think, is that we were attempting to avoid appointing electing selecting anyone who would then be in a position to exercise power over us. We recognized I think, in the not very few way, the effects that structures could have on the exercise of power. And we attempted to avoid them by not building structures. Now, we also want to we also try to work collectively, and a particular kind of working collectively, that I've that I want to single out as a kind of extreme form, in which we insisted that the work done by each member of a group had to be the same as the work done by every other member. Now, not all collectors work this way, but a large number of do. And I think that if you look at that, there's a statement about the nature of power contained in that. And what it says is that differences of any store are likely to lead to inequality, domination. And this form of collective, I think, is yet another way that we try to spin this to avoid exercise of power, by avoiding the creation or reinforcement of differences among women, that might allow someone to gain a position from which to dominate others. And then if we look at the emphasis on process, we can we all remember probably the emphasis on the growing self, the evolving consciousness and so on. And we all may or may remember as well, the practice of freeing up matters for discussion, again and again until everyone present the 20. Agree, or else the practice of remaking rethinking decisions, when a new woman shows up in a meeting for the first time and says she really doesn't agree. Now, I didn't have any conception. I think I think that means that we need to do is to look at the theory contained in that. That is, I think the great way that we get to making sure that everyone was satisfied, makes it clear our reluctance to use the power of the majority to dominate anything. What we discovered in the midst of of this great effort to destroy difference was that our differences persisted and they couldn't even though progress on the With an intractable follow up, I think this was a very painful period splits. Unknown Speaker 20:09 In particular, the desperate split was more difficult in some places than others. That is using, I think, the black model once again, for justification, we began to separate ourselves from our oppressors. But as we had first responded to male domination by saying, and when it became clear then that heterosexual women were oppressing lesbians and trying to make an invisible within the lavender medicines. And when it became clear that middle and upper class women were oppressing working class women, while the natural response was to split into smaller units. And these units meant, in theory, that no woman hatching are politically with others who might be in a position, whether through class race, or heterosexual privilege, but no one will be in a position to exercise power over another. And most recently, I think we've begun to see some of the academic activists split. I guess finally, related to separatism to this been the creation of women's spaces, women's communities, and lesbian feminists have been particularly active and important. And this, I think, on one hand, and attempt to overcome some differences, but it also is a pattern as part of this pattern of avoiding those who might have power over the creation of a separate space. Each of these actions, and I almost hesitate to call them conscious tactics, because I think that word that fear of doing each of these actions was a way of either of avoiding either exercising power, or confronting and their ways of making comfortable spaces for centers to exist. Now, let me say very clearly, that each of these things, I think wasn't was an unquestioned, correct action at the time. I think that it's absolutely essential to the survival of feminists not to have to deal with the oppressor all the time, I think we absolutely have to have safe spaces where we can live and grow. Unknown Speaker 22:28 But what I want to do is to say now, what's, what's this set of actions say about our understanding of power? Well, I think there really isn't an understanding of power implicitly. And basically, this is the peak your notion of power, that we extended this, with all of our with all of our separation from it. We're still accepting that as we were still saying, Howard means power oversight. Power means something which leads to the domination of other people. And certainly, that's the way that we had we had in the past, and up to that point, did experience power. Now are stiff. So I mean, it seems to me that there was that that patriarchal theory of power that we still held, that led really directly into our exercise, in separatism of a variety of sorts. I want to say that that I separatism was not simply a negative thing was not simply immediate, from the oppressor. mean, it's true that we were accepting the notion of parents domination. But what followed in that period, as it had, I think it was a real transformation of the nature and consequences of difference. And I think concomitantly, there was a transformation of our understanding, pardon theory and practice, but I think we really began to began to develop a different period. That is, you begin to see power as a form of energy. Statements referred to now as a feminist period. We began to take the power exercised in feminist groups, not as domination, but as an ability to act as has capacity, strength, energy ability. So Adrienne Rich exactly has talked about this, when she argues that women's power has been felt as a kind of energy looking for objects in itself, even sometimes, demonic possession. If arguing for the adoption of this understanding of how some years ago, I argued that we really, we were not sufficiently at that point, aware that power needed to be understood as energy, strength and effective action. And I also argued that we needed to recognize and confront at the same time, the world of traditional politics in which money and how it did function, similar rates. And what what I was what I had argued, I go on at this link, because I because I'm about to say I was wrong about this right. And now what I argued is we need to, we needed to set up organizations with who based on power is energy and string hoops which were structured, and not tied to the personality of a single individual. And but still groups was restructured, didn't permit the use of power as a tool for domination of others within that group. But at the same time, we needed as a group to be capable of dealing with power as control outside, then we really needed to face a very hostile society. I repeat this a sunlight, because on the one hand, I think that my views were fairly close to those of a larger independence. And what I think what I now see is my own errors in this were really widely repeated, and were widely widely talked about in humans. That is, we all talked about a feminist. I think that, that that theory of power reflected our experience within our separate communities. So let me talk a little bit about the fact that well, that experience was very much operating within a close community in which we didn't really have to deal with changing the world. And we could simply simply develop a sense of our own empowerment. And in fact, that was what happened in those communities. That was the result of separatism. And I think it was a very positive result that is we built, we built identities, communities, we learned useful ways, and we really developed the strengths. I think that one of the present were the way that worked in at least one city that it held talks about the common with the lavender, Herrick. way in which to pass on the Medina was to really give it as a as a political person. Well, one of the one of the great effects of lesbian separatism in Washington DC was that the term deich became not a term of abuse, but so one, that's that's a small example of the way differences can be really transformed Unknown Speaker 27:28 into something that doesn't simply feed into the oppressiveness of capitalist society. Now, another thing happened out of the development of separatism, and here I want to talk specifically about a lesbian feminist separatist group in Washington. The Furious split from the from the straightens. And they set up houses where they would live together. And one would think that, you know, this, we finally had a group that didn't have to deal with. Unknown Speaker 28:03 This has less than a week. And if you walk around the question of the class, Unknown Speaker 28:10 and in fact, some of the best trainers, everything done about was done by the curious. Now, let me tell you a little bit about how that worked. The collected included a number of low working class women, and class at that point had really not surfaced as an issue. And these women were concerned about the ways that middle class women in their collective oppressed. And one middle customer wrote this, she said, our assumptions about how to run a meeting are different. But we assumed that ours were correct, because they were easiest, given our college education, our ability to use words, our ability to abstract, our inability to make quick decisions, or fear of direct confrontation. And she says, I learned out of necessity, what classes and I changed more than I would have if I had not been with women who had class consciousness. That's oppression became no longer an abstract thing that I agreed with in principle, it was a part of my life, that I could see and change and having seen manifestations of class or myself, I better understood how class operated generally, to divide people. And they go on to say that, in the context of working for change, refusing to deal with class behavior in a lesbian feminist is sheer self indulgence and leads to the downfall of our global middle class women should look at that scale. That is the class system. They should examine where they fit in that scale, how it affected them, and what they thought of the people above and below them. But this examination does not get the because this is still they have to change their behavior. Seeing your class position, points out, that you are not necessarily the enemy, but that you too have been taken in by the system. Start thinking politically about the class system, and all the power systems stop being immersed in political ideas and abstractions that have little or nothing to do with your life, or anyone else's. Now, what specifically to be curious learned Unknown Speaker 30:29 when they began to think about how class functions have class among women, specifically among women? Well, one of the things they learned was the sense in which Unknown Speaker 30:42 middle class women and working through for that matter, have all taken for granted that the middle class way is the right way. Being middle class means that we know how to control people in institutions for your benefit. No one in the movement would say that she believes that she's better than her working class sisters. Yet the theories argued for behavior says it over and over again. Class supremacy, Unknown Speaker 31:07 they say it's active, Unknown Speaker 31:09 and thinking that working class women are less together personally and politically, because they'll talk afterwards, that middle class and class arrogance, curious theories examined in some detail. And they talked about the ways in which people look down on those who are less articulate the ways in which people whose emotions were not repressed, couldn't wrap up abstract theories in 30 seconds, Unknown Speaker 31:37 were regarded with scorn and pity. People who are pushy, dogmatic, hostile, and tolerant, were looked down upon. They also were concerned about middle class women advocating downward mobility, Unknown Speaker 31:50 and putting down those who are not as revolutionary. I mean, what I think is really critical for us about all of this is that middle class women in the women's movement set the standards for what was good. And as the theory is pointed out, the proper style of downward mobility is frequently very extensive. And new clusters and retain the control over. Now, it seems to me that that there are a lot of lessons to be drawn out of that experience. And I think most basically, what I want to draw for us here is that our differences are really unavoidable. And that the the effort to avoid them, put our heads in the sand really weakens us. And I think that one could work with five other segments of humans. That went through a similar experience to the theories around other issues, issues of race issues of sexuality. Now, it seems to me though, that we are now entering a kind of third stage. That is, we've moved a long way, from the point at which our differences are simply sources of our progression. I don't want to say that you have entirely transformed them into strength. But I think we have really moved a long way from the initial position that all we have in common. And at this point, I think what what we are on the verge of is rethinking, and, in fact, acting in a very different way about both power and difference. That is, if we're going to understand difference in a different way. That's great to read, I think, to get another understanding of how it works, it will go beyond the old feminist feminist theory of powers energy. It seems to me that that the feminist theory of power is energy, if you're not contraceptive workers that are self contained, is too contained. There's not an agency, it's not really saying, we are going to transform the world. I get the image of all of this energy, bottled up, fizzing up and down, but not doing anything. Unknown Speaker 34:09 Now. It is me that we can really only we can only develop new ways of working. And I think we're only on the verge of development. Unknown Speaker 34:26 Perhaps we can spend the workshop trying to think about what new theory of power we need to develop a better understanding of agency action and action, which is not simply dominated by other people. My own thoughts. It's really only a punch is that Marx's account of production in the non illuminated society might be a very useful kind of paradigm because here you have people working together, transforming the natural antiseptic social you We're not simply setting up a new system that we are going to have to develop. And I think secondly, you're now at the point of really trying to re understand the way class race and sexual differences affect all of us. We need to see, I think when I think the speakers this morning over here, about the different ways that capitalism, and patriarchy affect all of us. We need I think, even to look at biology. That is, I think we need to try to try to get a sense of what differences we want to preserve, what are valuable differences, differences that we through our actions have, in fact, made value. And we also need to look at differences in power relationships of black and Puna. Because it's quite new. I guess I would like to suggest that perhaps there's a three stage or at least two stage process. That is, the first thing I think we need to do is to educate ourselves. We need I think, to educate quite women in third world, I think many third world, women tend to see the women's side. That is, what they what they see is what the media has made of us. A bunch of white, upper middle class women Unknown Speaker 36:21 all have black domestic students. But I think also we need to educate black families, Unknown Speaker 36:28 about our own racism. And there, there are some things that have been done. The National Black Feminist Organization, along with Sagaris, did a workshop in which they attempted to explore the contradictions and connections between races. It was a fairly painful, but very good experience for the participants. And it seems to me that that, that the first thing is a kind of process of mutual education. Second, one of the most valuable things you can do is to really systematically share what we learned in our second experiences. That is, we really have been fragmented. But we have we have been fragmented. And I think that separately, we have learned, and we really need to systematically trade strategies and ideas. It seems to me that that only after that, can we begin to think about any kind of common action. And even then, here's, here's my own kind of speculative proposal, even then, it seems to me, I think that as a political movement, we need to preserve and in fact, even enhance our differences. That is, I think we need to make absolutely sure that there are spaces for women, which are closed to, I think there needs to be lesbian spaces that are posted heterosexual. And if we're going to work together politically, I think we need to build that kind of separatism into our organizations, we need to make sure that there are at least practices within the CEC that only this can be the basis for real rather than somebody saying the same. Now, the one thing that I this was needed for us to the, to the issue of Henry everyone. And it seems to me that the one thing that we need to make sure is that there can be no separate required meals as they they are the ones who always had to separate spaces. They're different. They're separate space. They're separate organizations have been a source of their power over all the rest of us. So that one, it seems to me it has to be absolutely prohibited. So this I mean, this brings me then to the to the final point. Anyway, when I began to write about feminist politics energy, I also thought that our new urbanists, our organizations might need to serve as the groundwork for new societal institutions. The organizations we build are an integral part of the process have raised a series of questions about which I think are still special, I would answer them altogether differently. They may provide some more for us to discuss. That is, to what extent should we build organizations which mirror the institutions we're trying to destroy? To what extent would we our organization To be transformed in our struggle for political organization service tools for taking care of for women, and still lay the groundwork for non sexist. Not silly questions. But my sense now is, is that we really need to face the contradiction between means in any organization. It would be nice if our organizations did prefigure the society that we wanted to build, I think it's important to try. But the thing, my looking back over the history of the women's group, and looking at the different organizations that we tried at different points in time, and also my sense that different things were correct at those different points of time. That makes me really wonder that makes me think, sometimes, organizations can prefigure the post revolutionary society. In some ways, perhaps. But that's really not not a kind of tenant that we should take for granted that we build the new society, in the belly of the earth. We certainly don't want a separatist in segregated society today. But the thing that that I really struck with having having looked at at our history here is that there really is a tension between the Unknown Speaker 41:27 means that we use and the ends that we seek. That, in a sense, what we're seeking is a kind of real universality. Through an accentuation of the divisions between the distinctions, the differences between when I talk about the Marxist revolutionary idea as well, which is to try to institute a classless society, by means of instituting another class dominated society, that is through the dictatorship of the proletariat. So I think there's a sense in which this problem of means or is not simply that it was revolutionary. And we should try to solve it by saying that, essentially that by looking at the history of the women's movement and the history of difference, like, what we've learned is that political change is a process of transforming not only ourselves, but also our most basic assumptions about humanity and our sense of human possibility. It means restructuring our organizations to reflect our constantly changing understanding of the past. And I think perhaps one of one of the criteria we need to use one of the questions we need to ask every strategy is does the strategy contain at least to see the return supersession but is it a way to deliver doing the same things for the same people? well laid out prosthetic questions, and nobody else has gotten through maybe which, which thing do you want to start with? Nick, I mean, perhaps you could take take maybe 10 minutes for just clarifications in particular Mormon. Stories Unknown Speaker 43:59 isn't clearly state Unknown Speaker 44:04 of concern Unknown Speaker 44:06 for what's going on within women's education have declined there Unknown Speaker 44:20 but that doesn't mean that that is good. That you know that they're not mutually exclusive. With this agency Unknown Speaker 45:00 So basically ultimately Unknown Speaker 45:09 I should say the stages really agree with my interpretation of the particular part of the movement and I was adopted Yeah, but what I mean like the dates I think to be dishonest but the stages I think you do reflect something but I think it's also me to separate them out in a nice way Here we end this part that it isn't true that because they really do overlap and allow me to do everything together. But it seems to me that but it's only once we get a new unified working on your real problems and once again the housing public transportation out of that become very different things have gone in a sense from powerless to feel empowered but not not Unknown Speaker 46:17 not having a compass. That means obviously to score and this is a tricky issue with agencies in practice. It is a sense in which I think I'm in agreement with that. Unknown Speaker 47:04 I'm saying that the records were discovered and we learned that we can't just say that I don't notice racial differences anymore we've created a movement of society that is that sisterhood I think it was not it was there was exciting and I think we felt it but in terms of really looking at differences I think they do and I think a real system would recognize that for example it can be productive policies affect Unknown Speaker 47:38 women and white in a different way possibly Christmas Eve Unknown Speaker 48:22 this wants Unknown Speaker 48:27 to be replicated means that we communicate to preserve the difference that is make them is great quality and yeah I think he's really well into the discussion issue so maybe I just That's why game Unknown Speaker 49:43 discussing politics may become prominent Unknown Speaker 49:50 more begins to become on It begins to Unknown Speaker 50:15 unclear that how to run this is a discussion that isn't random. So, maybe Can we can we try to sort of stick on this particular point for just a minute Unknown Speaker 50:39 possible i because you're insane out there I want to make clear to you scattered why is that important strategy is to do whatever you have to do to feel Unknown Speaker 52:12 separate to change in terms of is Unknown Speaker 52:25 this point very important issue is that that doesn't exist political power is somebody in the current deficit told me is going to show up as the differences and I think that's exactly what's happening in my experience and my women's is to give to those who have privilege heterosexual power to say the power to articulate the power to position is not Unknown Speaker 53:24 great what is Unknown Speaker 53:28 more important to us teenager it is very hard to predict what heterosexism is watching yourself in ways that I went through much to what it means to switch from per cell to everything I've heard a lot of things about that mother's Council publish books to high school students yourself as a as a guest yourself and that's an exam. Access access is not me All right take Unknown Speaker 55:19 care certain their Unknown Speaker 55:37 questions now still tell you with a tariff Unknown Speaker 56:42 certainly helped. Unknown Speaker 57:41 The things that, that I think the the things that we need to do to this is a building organizations with the kind of stuff only only the most committed Unknown Speaker 57:53 activist people can grasp the principles you know, just very, very nitty gritty stuff. Here, here's a basis on YouTube together, taking a dozen phone calls a day Unknown Speaker 58:14 seems to Unknown Speaker 58:17 matter. The business of writing these these 10 drafts going into these infant room disobedience, contacting a lot of other women who are not now active, like to say, what can we work together? What what are the issues in his community around the women's Ultimate is just coming up quite an exciting topic. And we are now just beginning that process of going around to try to try to build a visible presence in one city. And a lot of that, I think is not not exciting. Maybe it's exciting, but I employ making the same thing over. And it seems to me that the process of building a unified movement is is really a very dull sort of process in terms of the kind of work but I think we can do it. And I think Unknown Speaker 59:18 I'm very serious. If I can sort of bring it back to the point that Unknown Speaker 59:28 I think this problem of moral principle as opposed to political strategy that was going Unknown Speaker 59:35 on here that I'm about to say I believe they are. Unknown Speaker 59:45 And I think that you know, that will really sharpen the discussion, because it seems to me that there isn't, there isn't a more principle on which we can we can have looked at the strategies of the women's movement and said, in principle we believe that all women should be right I get all that stuff, which is didn't lead to that. But I mean, it seems to me that what is what is right, and moral and political progressive differs from time to time. And let me just give you one more reference to sort of muddy the waters. In preparing for this, one of the things that I did was I read record press play, again, the measures taken. And it's a very fascinating play. And you might find that over the years I've changed sides are moving. And this is the story of his company's Chinese restaurant organizers who come over the border to China. And they're met by a young comrade, who says, Well, we're delighted to see you. Did you bring us a tractor, you know, whatever. And they say, No, we brought a bunch of pamphlets. And by the way, we'd like to limousine and then they go off to organize the young comrade. Or the young comrade gets them into trouble every time and they end up having to kill it and escape back over the border when he gets them into trouble. Because things like for example, he's leaving their underground his nuclear factory and a policeman comes up on the rest one of the workers who just has a week or two and says you You were the one who's the mental revolution in your bathroom arrest is worthless drag him off to prison execute on that you can't do this and he says no, no, I did it. And so he gets arrested and and the other people don't have to screen him and I guess you know what shows up there is that you know revolutionary YouTube Unknown Speaker 1:01:40 really is this Unknown Speaker 1:01:42 moral principle which is stand up for what you think is right don't allow innocent persons to separate Unknown Speaker 1:01:50 notices succeeded Unknown Speaker 1:01:52 really to shuffle Unknown Speaker 1:02:01 a lot of people writing about Unknown Speaker 1:02:19 does two things one of the things Unknown Speaker 1:02:30 I'm thinking about is it's a good time to have my own triggers basically and fear Well, that's fine. I'll get off and get my skis down. Unknown Speaker 1:02:49 But it has nothing to do Unknown Speaker 1:02:54 is what we are able to learn Unknown Speaker 1:02:59 question share dating experience hours Unknown Speaker 1:03:10 what you are is a Unknown Speaker 1:03:15 being there then then we get Unknown Speaker 1:03:27 ourselves out of the chair experience what we might call it enables us to find a new high rise to Unknown Speaker 1:03:38 steal everything out there do this because we still Unknown Speaker 1:03:54 do something about how we are still very much stuck with the definition the power to Unknown Speaker 1:04:05 get the rest to say you have to pay attention with this this is what is important was Unknown Speaker 1:04:28 there have to be useful in our everyday lives. Unknown Speaker 1:04:54 To people to try The society people Unknown Speaker 1:05:43 get that question so how can we keep our leaders accountable to us rather than to the media very good American Eagle Unknown Speaker 1:06:03 as far away from Unknown Speaker 1:06:07 another separate Unknown Speaker 1:06:18 to wait and the society's responsive to us unless we incrementally get taken away they try to use the social structures and practices mentioned to be responsive to us once the social stuff is recognize them as doing this they recognize that and then we don't have that right you know Unknown Speaker 1:07:04 I'm thinking that you say these women have become powerful Unknown Speaker 1:07:11 that academia has had a sort of impact Unknown Speaker 1:07:16 social order which has an impact and I think is another question whether your questions are being in connection with the leaders and supporting them also to the arts crashing the women who have found a voice Unknown Speaker 1:07:37 I'm not saying this Unknown Speaker 1:07:41 but there are going to make me feel bad and viruses is essentially a tragedy for me particularly so I questioned right evening would you be Unknown Speaker 1:09:00 with rasa as I really don't want this to turn into a clinic last time Unknown Speaker 1:09:27 I take this issue and I want to say this here with something quite different to recognizing that has Unknown Speaker 1:09:56 to do with my vision Unknown Speaker 1:09:57 of building Unknown Speaker 1:10:00 Within the way those skills Unknown Speaker 1:10:08 that one person can because they were, you know, they went to the person from dominate another person backing developing leadership skills are all old ways of determining what to expect Unknown Speaker 1:10:55 and how I'd like to just carry that a little further. Because even to invoke the name of one of the things that I mean, I think that that one of the things that we really do suffer from and, and the role of our leaders and the way the immediate chooses and for us was really, I think, a reflection of what many organizations primitiveness and I continue this really right, if, if we had an organization which, which would allow us to say, This person is our leader, now is the only thing that comes close to it with the now president says membership doesn't actually can go out next year principle we don't have that kind of that kind of organizational data we don't have the kind of monetary rewards that that I think that we could do it but it seems to me that that's that's really great because I have leaders that are our leaders we need to make an Elemis past few years feminism differences that was going to be as relevant as left handedness of race and gender then nobody ever again because I was one of those things but generally does the the big Unknown Speaker 1:13:20 plus we really does have to be reduced or eliminated. So that you said the special skills, consciousness is that Unknown Speaker 1:13:34 is that I think we have to be getting into leadership accountability organization, Unknown Speaker 1:13:43 but we want to see another point. And then eventually the idea is something that I really meant mental space for black women, lesbian. It's really a very important idea. And I even participate with everyone else. We put a smile recognition and he said that it was wonderful feel, does not need any space. Unknown Speaker 1:14:38 And that was a white male. And I reacted the same way and I think that has to be qualified. Say why? First of all, we're thinking about suicide. And I assume you assume that men are And now at this point, I realized that white males have their own space. So whiteness, kind of like whatever means your own upbringing, their participation and radical upgrading as I had, which itself was quite a process, but for some of them, their own interpretation of that movement for them to find different ways in which they really have more in common. And I think my own husband and a few other men of that, that I know, my generation, it's not for that I know, I wouldn't expect the married, I wouldn't be professional, or I wouldn't be professional or whatever it is, to recognize that there are some white males we do have an understanding of the space for them. And not only that, I'm thinking of the sample of an infant, right, we spoke about a black lesbian mother raising a son, he had a new point of view was being raised in a really different way, you will also find white lesbian mothers doing the same thing, as well as other mothers. So we don't have white males in the society. And I don't think we're Unknown Speaker 1:16:30 clear about what it was I'm saying. I was saying that I don't think that there should be any organizations, any political organizations within which white males are young. That is, I think, all organizations that point is built to be open to anyone. So that if we were to have a revolutionary party, there should certainly be quite nails in it, but there should not be any men's caucus in this conference. But there shouldn't be appointment of the caucus. You're not one of the things that I that I have experienced in terms of the feminist movements that I'm in touch with is that we really are now in a position of strength rather than weakness getting ready to think about how we can work with men. Unknown Speaker 1:17:46 Yeah, but I guess I'm making a distinction between male consciousness and you know, in the political trying to sort of think about what would be the shape of a unified political movement that we might somehow that we as feminists with all of Unknown Speaker 1:18:04 our differences to be part of sometime in the next 10 years that's to me that's what was in the back of my mind the weather Unknown Speaker 1:18:37 changes changing Unknown Speaker 1:18:56 all right in the face Unknown Speaker 1:19:22 of richer, smarter and better It seems to me that very amusing rhetoric. And there has historically been certain questions however Unknown Speaker 1:20:14 I think many people have Unknown Speaker 1:20:15 seen that kind of oppression experience has always remained consistent, refreshing. And that's true. For instance, I've been and I've watched the changing nature of depression Unknown Speaker 1:20:37 courage, currently most Unknown Speaker 1:20:42 of your letter stated very definite upon the point that is to be committed in the degree to which Unknown Speaker 1:20:51 he is committed, that is a question that if is perhaps less visibly drastic, but in some ways it is harder to stomach than a day's going through the south and we have a clear and present enemy struggling and other sisters could see that pressure on in many ways, that one of the things are looking at needs to come to terms with as we struggled to create a pattern to affect external change Unknown Speaker 1:21:31 got to deal with change the nature of oppression of people on the basis of differences and we've got different ways of practices and each one of us for instance so, would come up for me or a totally other breeds of difference, we can affect the organization having strategies and having systems of credibility of having structures that mirror and at the same time we can raise questions about the internal practices. Now, I can assure you at least the national that some of the practices and the practices results in will be spying on the election of a sexual middle class leadership was claimed it could articulate the needs for all of us to challenge that is not to say that women are not important, but it is to say that they cannot adequately articulate Unknown Speaker 1:23:01 it and when I hear happens more sophisticated with our teeth the difference is that we begin to kind of state the articulation of that for actual change and it is. Unknown Speaker 1:23:37 Through particularly, interestingly enough, it is of course, the white middle class no Unknown Speaker 1:23:48 I have all this purpose. Let us use exactly that kind of wealth personal differences. Take it out feeling sort of scattered Mostly what do you think Unknown Speaker 1:25:02 we should we should use the male power structures more dangerous Unknown Speaker 1:25:22 you pick those up Unknown Speaker 1:25:27 based on ancient Unknown Speaker 1:25:47 some good ideas by x looking Unknown Speaker 1:26:11 to conserve. The underlying Unknown Speaker 1:27:47 strategy Unknown Speaker 1:27:57 and returns are fabulous Unknown Speaker 1:28:02 I subscribe to the theory today reflect as the activists Unknown Speaker 1:28:44 do really reasonably good evening you asking Unknown Speaker 1:29:59 so For the second thing I have to say I have a personal stake that's a concern to other people. Unknown Speaker 1:31:12 In the midst of this Unknown Speaker 1:31:20 thing is I really have lived in the center of seven years, which has been but I'll take advantage of one of the things we went through in Washington DC something