111 lines
6.3 KiB
Plaintext
111 lines
6.3 KiB
Plaintext
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VISIONS OF FREEDOM - AN ANARCHA-FEMINIST PERSPECTIVE
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Organised by an anarchist collective in Sydney, Visions of Freedom
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in January 1995 held for me the promise of something much
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more politically relevant than other conferences i have attended
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over the past few years. Although there were a large number of
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workshops/presentations scheduled forthe weekend, organisers urged
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participants to set up their own workshops - directly in contrast to
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the rigid scheduling of sessions in academic, student-based and left
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conferences. This freedom meant that theoretically there was no one
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agenda set for the weekend, that it was up to us to create
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meaningful discussion. Being an anarchist conference, i also hoped
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that i would not need to do as much sifting and reinterpretation of
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political ideas, as is so often necessary at the usual type of
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conferences, and was looking forward to meeting with a whole heap of
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activists with a lot of interesting and challenging things to say.
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The plenary was opened by a blessing from Monsignor Porca Madonna,
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presenting a queer mockery of the recent papal visit. Following
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this, people from various anarchist perspectives spoke, with a short
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time for questions of each. What became apparent during this opening
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session was the reluctance of women to ask questions (and this
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relative silence was evident throughout the weekend) This reluctance
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had also make it difficult for the organisers to find a woman who
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would speak about feminism at the plenary. The male speakers for the
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most part focussed on theoretical and historical analysis of
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anarchist struggle, the woman who spoke about feminism offered
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mainly anecdotes and personal stories. Although i value and think
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necessary the subjective experience of women as political, in this
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context it seemed that the *real* anarchist politics was the domain of
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men, and that women's political experience and analysis was not
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taken as seriously, was marginalised and not placed as central to
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debate.
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The Anarchy and Feminism workshop on the Saturday afternoon was one
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of the most well-attended workshops of the weekend - with over 100
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people in the room a lot of our time was actually taken up with
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working out how to get the most out of it. By the time we broke
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up into small groups we had half an hour for discussion, then 20
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minutes to report back to the larger group. Not long. The number of
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people and the range oftopics - pornography and sex work, violence
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and militarism, direct action, essentialism and strutures, racism,
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feminist responses to the state and media representations -
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suggested that this workshop was merely a starting point, a means of
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finding common interest. It also shows that we shouldn't be letting
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feminist politics be seen as only vaguely relevant to anarchism, as
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a single issue, a women's issue. Many feminist concerns are
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absolutely central to the anarchist struggle, and challenge and
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inform the way we actually perceive anarchism.
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Queer visibility at the conference was often in contradictory ways.
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The organisers recognised queers within anarchism from the beginning,
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with the opening blessing and a speaker from the Sisters of the
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Order of perpetual Indulgence on the links between gay struggle and
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anarchism. However, this was undermined throughout the weekend by
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other participants - s/m was referred to several times in the context
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of violence, homophobic material was circulated and when it was
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removed notions of censorship and freedom of speech were invoked,
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leading us to question just who exactly is free to speak, it seems
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to help if you are a white heterosexual male. In the queer workshop we
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also had the same problem of not enough time to discuss all the
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thingsthat came up - isolation withing anarchism,critiqueof
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mainstream heterosexuality, critique of mainstream homocapitalism,
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coalition politics, direct action and ideas for change.
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Throughout the weekend, i spoke to many women who were frustrated
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and angry at how they were being treated in workshops and how their
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politics were belittled or dismissed. The predominantly white men at
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the conference seemed to think that by taking on the label anarchism
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that they have magically transcended the racial, gender and sexual
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prejudices that are in our society, that a commitment to the
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politics of anarchism automatically justifies their behaviour. They
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are ready to point out the injustices of mainstream society, but
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unable to see when they are reinforcing the same inequalities.
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Working towards eradicating such prejudices means more than paying
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lip serivce to concepts of autonomy and equality, considering that
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some groups have more access to getting freedom than others. Even in the
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Anarchy and Feminism workshop, the one workshop that placed women as
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central to discussion, men were unable to restrain themselves from
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trying to dominate and undermine discussion.
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If as anarchists we are serious in our challenge of authority,
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hierarchy and violence, then we need to recognise the very complex
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ways in which power is exercised in our society. The hierarchy is
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systematic and multifaceted, and is not changed by adhering to a code
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of so-called revolutionary politics that repeatedly excludes the
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experience of and refuses to be open to challenge from the other.
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At the same time, i think that if women had been better organise
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before the conference we would have had more of a chance of
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directing debate in relevant and useful ways. If we had felt more
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confident about challenging the male domain and had been stronger
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as a group, then it wouldn't have been left to a few brave
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individuals to put themselves on the line. Quite a few women said to
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me that they would have liked to have seen more workshops organised
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by feminists and queers, but seemed unwilling to organise them and i
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wonder why this is the case. Sadly i feel that sometimes it is
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easier to complain about what is offered to us than to create what
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it is we really want.
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Overall, i feel that most of what i learnt and valued over the
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weekend were the conversations outside of the conference itself. I
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met a lot ofimpassioned and inspiring women (and a couple of men)
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and had some really challenging discussions. I am also aware of just
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how much more preparation i want to do before the next one so that i
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am a lot clearer about what i want to get out of it, and how that
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might be done.
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nicki
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