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Ain't I A Woman? newspapers, June 1970-July 1971

1970-12-11 "Ain't I a Woman" Page 11

   Please address all future correspondence concerning a Journal of Female Liberation (No More Fun & Games, The Female State) to: 

Cell 16
16 Lexington Avenue
Cambridge, Mass. 02138

   We are no longer producing and distributing the Journal at the Boylston Street address because that office has been taken over and is being occupied by female members of YSA/SWP (Young Socialist Alliance of Socialist Workers Party) who had been working out of that office. Since November 14, we have had no access to mail addressed there.
   The takeover last week was the climax of a long series of troubles with YSA. The following is an attempt to give the history of cell 16 and to describe what led up to the frustrating and depressing situation created by the takeover.

   After working together informally for about a year, we, along with Roxanne Dunbar (now working in New Orleans) and Jeanne Lafferty (now in YSA), established ourselves as a small group to put out the Journal and work on a feminist analysis. This was in May 1969. We took the name Cell 16 to emphasize the organic nature of the movement, of which we were just one cell. We did not wish to be the movement or have all women join us: we wished to be part of the movement, a radical and creative force in finding the most relevant directions for the feminist movement.
   Because we were a small group and in political agreement, our democracy was spontaneous. When political disagreement arose with one or two of our original members, we disbanded the group as a formal entity rather than to either impose the majority will on those who disagreed or waste time in conflict with each other.
 
   At this time we moved our office equipment to Somerville, intending that the Journal should remain, as it always had been, a strong and unified feminist statement. We formed a Committee to ensure control over the established character and purpose of the Journal and the office whose primary function was the production of the Journal. In this respect the Finance Committee, as it was called, was an attempt to replace that particular function of Cell 16.
   A Journal fund (including income from sales of the Journal) supported Journal printings and reprintings, the office rent and expenses, and the salary of one person working full time.

   Cell 16 having disbanded, the Finance Committee had political control only over the Journal, administrative control only over the office finances, and no control over any other activities in the office. Thus there were no longer any clear-cut or natural limits on who could use the office. 
   The office did begin to be used by various women with whom we were not actively associated and in whose activities we didn't necessarily want to participate. We felt that we could have no  legitimate objections as long as the primacy of the Journal was respected. These other activities were being made possible through the Journal's financial support of the office.

   It was at this point that some women who had worked with us previously revealed that they had joined YSA. They began to "organize" the informal office meetings, and brought other YSA women in. The woman on salary and others working in the office on Journal distribution became alarmed since the YSA had a reputation for infiltration and takeover. They tried to keep the YSA women out of the office, finally going so far as to change the lock on the office door.

[hand drawing of 4 women]

   We opposed this, feeling that the action taken against the YSA women was inappropriate; that until there was an overt attempt to take control of the Journal or office we were not justified in purging people with whom we had worked comfortably in the past.

   The women who had serious disagreement with the female YSA members left. We moved the office to Boston. Many more YSA/SWP women then "joined" Female Liberation. 
   The office became a highly organized women's center. The weekly business meetings (to which we never went because we didn't recognize their right to alter the purpose of the office) presumed to vote on all office decisions, not just decisions on their activities. This was intolerable. And our political disagreements with them on feminism as well as their general disrespect for us and our work had by this time become increasingly intolerable as well.

   In many of their statements and by the action of joining YSA they indicate that they believe that a feminist movement is insufficient to accomplish fundamental social change. In their view SWP will be the vanguard of any change that comes. Women are merely one segment of the masses they will lead.
   The YSA/SWP politics lends them to believe that they are justified in any intervention because their understanding of social change is better than anyone else's. Their function as they see it as as leaders of the masses. These masses must be molded into movements, infiltrated and controlled in order to be directed in the correct way.

   For tactical reasons they confuse the meaning of a group with the meaning of a movement. Under the guise of saying that no one should be excluded from movements they attempt to prevent the exclusion of anyone from any group. This means that any group can be infiltrated with ease. 
   The YSA women insisted on using the name Female Liberation as a name for their group even though we had always asserted that the name should not be used as a group name because we wanted all women in the movement to feel free to use it as the movement name. 
   In our office, moreover, they established coalitions with groups with which we had no political agreement, only common goals - as when they worked with anti-feminists on abortion law repeal.
  Their use of coalitions has been to give them access to greater numbers of people. The effect is to neutralize the integrity and intensity of individual groups. 

  The Journal fund was still supporting the office and original Journal activities were still doing all the clerical work of maintaining the mailing lists and filling Journal orders.
   Since the expanded activities and coalitions made the purpose of the office confused and the functioning so diffuse that even the future of the Journal seemed threatened, the Finance Committee met and decided that we had to re-establish the original principles by placing the office money especially allocated for future Journal printings and reprintings into a separate bank account.

   This would have separated it from the account used generally by consent of the business meeting group for their previous projects. (Up until then, these projects were financed largely by the Journal profits, contrary to our original intentions when we set up the office.)
   We said that we would continue to pay the office expenses out of the Journal fund and agreed that they could continue to use the office provided they didn't interfere with the Journal work.
   Two representatives of the business meeting group agreed to these conditions.

   However, at their next business meeting they voted to dissolve the Finance Committee, to keep all the Journal money, to choose their own Journal committee to put out future Journals, and to incorporate as "Female Liberation, Inc." under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in order to protect their use of that name and to attempt to establish a legal right to the money, Journals, and mail.

   The Corporation accuses us of trying to destroy the Women's movement by not permitting them to use the Journal as capital to finance their activities.
   Our response to this is that they are not the movement, only one of the many diverse groups within it; nor is the movement dependent on their organizing activities. Female liberation is a response to an objective reality of oppression not a hysteria drummed up by organizers.

  We have always asserted our belief that movements grow only when there are vital individuals and groups doing what feels most important and relevant and progressing as fast as they can in their analysis: developing and spreading the ideas that brought them together.
   They should not attempt to become the movement themselves by bringing everyone into their group (thus impeding its efficiency and diluting its message), but offer their ideas and analysis to others through writing and talking.

   The greater the number of groups which are encouraged to contribute their various perspectives to the movement in and undiluted form, the richer and more varied the whole movement will grow. It will be less likely that it will turn into a one-issue movement.

   At present we are operating out of our old Cell 16 office and again calling ourselves Cell 16. Those who have been interested in or have agreed with the principles expressed in previous Journals should address future correspondence to us. It may be impossible for us ever to get the mail addressed to the office in Boston.

Cell 16: Dana Densmore, Lisa Leghorn, Abby Rockefeller, Betsy Warrior, Jayne West

A WOMAN?    December 11, 1970    11

Saving...

Please address all future correspondence concerning a Journal of Female Liberation (No More Fun & Games, The Female State) to: Cell 16 16 Lexington Avenue Cambridge, Mass. 02138 We are no longer producing and distributing the Journal at the Boylston Street address because that office has been taken over and is being occupied by female members of YSA/SWP (Young Socialist Alliance of Socialist Workers Party) who had been working out of that office. Since November 14, we have had no access to mail addressed there. The takeover last week was the climax of a long series of troubles with YSA. The following is an attempt to give the history of cell 16 and to describe what led up to the frustrating and depressing situation created by the takeover. After working together informally for about a year, we, along with Roxanne Dunbar (now working in New Orleans) and Jeanne Lafferty (now in YSA), established ourselves as a small group to put out the Journal and work on a feminist analysis. This was in May 1969. We took the name Cell 16 to emphasize the organic nature of the movement, of which we were just one cell. We did not wish to be the movement or have all women join us: we wished to be part of the movement, a radical and creative force in finding the most relevant directions for the feminist movement. Because we were a small group and in political agreement, our democracy was spontaneous. When political disagreement arose with one or two of our original members, we disbanded the group as a formal entity rather than to either impose the majority will on those who disagreed or waste time in conflict with each other. At this time we moved our office equipment to Somerville, intending that the Journal should remain, as it always had been, a strong and unified feminist statement. We formed a Committee to ensure control over the established character and purpose of the Journal and the office whose primary function was the production of the Journal. In this respect the Finance Committee, as it was called, was an attempt to replace that particular function of Cell 16. A Journal fund (including income from sales of the Journal) supported Journal printings and reprintings, the office rent and expenses, and the salary of one person working full time. Cell 16 having disbanded, the Finance Committee had political control only over the Journal, administrative control only over the office finances, and no control over any other activities in the office. Thus there were no longer any clear-cut or natural limits on who could use the office. The office did begin to be used by various women with whom we were not actively associated and in whose activities we didn't necessarily want to participate. We felt that we could have no legitimate objections as long as the primacy of the Journal was respected. These other activities were being made possible through the Journal's financial support of the office. It was at this point that some women who had worked with us previously revealed that they had joined YSA. They began to "organize" the informal office meetings, and brought other YSA women in. The woman on salary and others working in the office on Journal distribution became alarmed since the YSA had a reputation for infiltration and takeover. They tried to keep the YSA women out of the office, finally going so far as to change the lock on the office door. [hand drawing of 4 women] We opposed this, feeling that the action taken against the YSA women was inappropriate; that until there was an overt attempt to take control of the Journal or office we were not justified in purging people with whom we had worked comfortably in the past. The women who had serious disagreement with the female YSA members left. We moved the office to Boston. Many more YSA/SWP women then "joined" Female Liberation. The office became a highly organized women's center. The weekly business meetings (to which we never went because we didn't recognize their right to alter the purpose of the office) presumed to vote on all office decisions, not just decisions on their activities. This was intolerable. And our political disagreements with them on feminism as well as their general disrespect for us and our work had by this time become increasingly intolerable as well. In many of their statements and by the action of joining YSA they indicate that they believe that a feminist movement is insufficient to accomplish fundamental social change. In their view SWP will be the vanguard of any change that comes. Women are merely one segment of the masses they will lead. The YSA/SWP politics lends them to believe that they are justified in any intervention because their understanding of social change is better than anyone else's. Their function as they see it as as leaders of the masses. These masses must be molded into movements, infiltrated and controlled in order to be directed in the correct way. For tactical reasons they confuse the meaning of a group with the meaning of a movement. Under the guise of saying that no one should be excluded from movements they attempt to prevent the exclusion of anyone from any group. This means that any group can be infiltrated with ease. The YSA women insisted on using the name Female Liberation as a name for their group even though we had always asserted that the name should not be used as a group name because we wanted all women in the movement to feel free to use it as the movement name. In our office, moreover, they established coalitions with groups with which we had no political agreement, only common goals - as when they worked with anti-feminists on abortion law repeal. Their use of coalitions has been to give them access to greater numbers of people. The effect is to neutralize the integrity and intensity of individual groups. The Journal fund was still supporting the office and original Journal activities were still doing all the clerical work of maintaining the mailing lists and filling Journal orders. Since the expanded activities and coalitions made the purpose of the office confused and the functioning so diffuse that even the future of the Journal seemed threatened, the Finance Committee met and decided that we had to re-establish the original principles by placing the office money especially allocated for future Journal printings and reprintings into a separate bank account. This would have separated it from the account used generally by consent of the business meeting group for their previous projects. (Up until then, these projects were financed largely by the Journal profits, contrary to our original intentions when we set up the office.) We said that we would continue to pay the office expenses out of the Journal fund and agreed that they could continue to use the office provided they didn't interfere with the Journal work. Two representatives of the business meeting group agreed to these conditions. However, at their next business meeting they voted to dissolve the Finance Committee, to keep all the Journal money, to choose their own Journal committee to put out future Journals, and to incorporate as "Female Liberation, Inc." under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in order to protect their use of that name and to attempt to establish a legal right to the money, Journals, and mail. The Corporation accuses us of trying to destroy the Women's movement by not permitting them to use the Journal as capital to finance their activities. Our response to this is that they are not the movement, only one of the many diverse groups within it; nor is the movement dependent on their organizing activities. Female liberation is a response to an objective reality of oppression not a hysteria drummed up by organizers. We have always asserted our belief that movements grow only when there are vital individuals and groups doing what feels most important and relevant and progressing as fast as they can in their analysis: developing and spreading the ideas that brought them together. They should not attempt to become the movement themselves by bringing everyone into their group (thus impeding its efficiency and diluting its message), but offer their ideas and analysis to others through writing and talking. The greater the number of groups which are encouraged to contribute their various perspectives to the movement in and undiluted form, the richer and more varied the whole movement will grow. It will be less likely that it will turn into a one-issue movement. At present we are operating out of our old Cell 16 office and again calling ourselves Cell 16. Those who have been interested in or have agreed with the principles expressed in previous Journals should address future correspondence to us. It may be impossible for us ever to get the mail addressed to the office in Boston. Cell 16: Dana Densmore, Lisa Leghorn, Abby Rockefeller, Betsy Warrior, Jayne West A WOMAN? December 11, 1970 11