Everyone needs to read this, because it is MADE OF AWESOME.
To be honest there isn't really anything else i can say about it that it doesn't say itself, except that it's absolutely essential reading for anyone with even the vaguest interest in feminism, anti-hierarchy, anti-capitalism and the intersections between them.
There's an incredibly long and high-quality comment thread as well, which is the equal of any discussion thread on communities such as Barbelith.
The Ring cannot be used against the Dark Lord, because it is from him and of him, and anyone who uses it will end up either serving him or becoming him. The Master's tools cannot be used to demolish the Master's house. Lots of stuff i could spin off that, including a critique of campaigns for the "right to marriage", the relationship between the disability rights movement and certain charities who claim to be "campaigning for equality", government- and corporation-funded "technofixes" for global ecological crises, etc etc, but those will in all probability be the subject of future posts.
I think i need to start a "favourite quotes" and "favourite pieces of writing" page or link list...
Lack of activity recently has been due to a strange form of writer's block, which has been allowing me to start writing lots of posts, but not to finish them. Hopefully i'll manage to turn some of those drafts into publishably comprehensible posts soon-ish...
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
The one thing that I don't quite understand about her post is this: She seems to be saying that you are either entirely in the Master's house, or entirely out of it. Where does that leave me?
Where does that leave someone like me?
I am white, upper-middle class, born and raised in insulated, almost lily-white suburbs, grew up with color-blind "liberalism" that's just a thin veneer to racism and privilege, and currently work for a small, very expensive liberal arts college for which students need a hell of a lot of economic privilege to even think of affording.
BUT: I am a woman, I am trans, I am Jewish (and we've seen a rising tide of violent anti-Semitism in the U.S. - I don't know if that's the case in the UK), I have multiple disabilities, including a chronic pain condition that is hidden and treated dismissively, like I'm a malingerer, and I am currently being evaluated for autism.
So, where am I? In or out? Does my white-skin privilege and class privilege trump everything else? Do we engage in some kind of game, totalling the privileges and comparing against the oppressions?
I totally agree with her criticism of Hugu Schwyzer. I find him to be extremely elitist, and very patronizing and insulting to anybody who dares to challenge his very white, cissexual, heterosexual viewpoint. And his defense of the market is unforgivable, when the market is what the Master uses to crush so many people.
But I feel like brownfemipower is setting up a binary - you're either completely in or completely out of the Master's house. There's lot's of "tweeners" like myself; lots of people who are simultaneously members of both oppressor groups and oppressed groups.
Or, is the fact that one is a member of even one oppressor class sufficient for you to get booted into the house? Where does that leave poor, black lesbians who are transphobic?
I don't know, maybe I'm completely misreading brownfemipower's words, but this troubles me.
I've got a post planned on the relationship between disability and class which will address at least some of your concerns, so i'll leave responding until i've worked out my thoughts on it fully coherently (often writing a blog post on something is my way of fully working out my position on it)...
I tend to see it the opposite way to your last paragraph: being a member of even one non-privileged group gets you kicked out of the house - but, of course, it isn't that simple, as all the FDRs and Condoleeza Rices of history attest. Actually, i probably think it's a bit of one and a bit of the other, at the same time; i think it's perfectly possible to be both oppressed and an oppressor, simultaneously but in different contexts, and indeed i think most human beings are; one may have a sonic screwdriver in one hand and a laser screwdriver in the other... ;)
OK, overuse of sci-fi/fantasy puns and/or metaphors means i probably ought to go to bed. Thanks for commenting though - i'm definitely going to write something soon-ish on the issues you mention...
i think it's perfectly possible to be both oppressed and an oppressor, simultaneously but in different contexts
Which is basically my point, that most people are a blend of both, and many people who are not permitted in the House still need to confront their privileges.
Oh, and I misspelled Schwyzer's first name - It should be "HugeEgo", not "Hugu" ;)
Exactly what is your problem with equal marriage rights?
Post a Comment