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Ain't I A Woman? newspapers, June 1970-July 1971
1971-03-12 "Ain't I a Woman?" Page 2
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PAINFUL TIMES Throughout the last year, people have been working hard at all sorts of productive work, general political analysis, support groups for gay women, child care, abortion, self-defense. Feminist publications are flourishing and women's living collectives and community centers have been growing in number. In spit of all of our accomplishments, many women have gone through some of the most difficult emotional struggles we've ever encountered, including the hassles we had in male-run politics and old personal relationships. In thinking back to the time when we were excitedly making plans for our new life styles and political activities it seems incredibly naive not to have been more realistic about anticipating hassles. In planning our work groups and living collectives we invisioned an environment relatively free from oppressive relationships, (old left semantic arguments and other things that retard (or make impossible) our struggle for radical change. Instead we found other problems -- gay women feeling oppressed by straight women, heterosexual and bi-sexual women feeling rejected by gay women, hostility between women of different classes, women with children feeling they have no place at all in women's liberation, charges of racism, painfully standing in the middle of two sisters you love who are fighting and feeling both of them are right ( or wrong), I've begun to think over some of the mistakes we made that have caused so many painful experiences. The only thing I'm sure about is that we were much too idealistic. We expected far too much from ourselves and our sisters in terms of how much we could change. We were unaware of how tight a grasp this society has on us. We were wrong in assuming we could all become perfect "post-revolutionary people" even before we've decided just what that might involve. We had such high expectations that every hurt and disappointment and failure was multiplied several times over. We must be careful not to give our sisters and ourselves false hopes of utopia in a feminist movement. We thought that because we are all women sharing the same oppression we could be easily united, that we were free from the pain we have felt before we came together. But that is not the way it is. (I still feel that as women with a Feminist consciousness, we have the potential and the responsibility to build a revolution.) We have run into some errors in our preconceptions about women working together. We assumed that because we were all females everything would work out well. Often, with that assumption in mind, we took less care in dealing with our sisters than we should have. People were hurt along the way. We were frustrated when we spoke with women whose politics were far from ours. Are "liberal" women our sisters or will they definitely be our enemies? Where do we draw the line? There may be a time when pacifism is definitely counter-revolutionary if it isn't already. Yet there are many female pacifists in the women's movement. We were angry when women from different lifestyles and with different experiences didn't understand us. We started women's collectives to live, to do political analysis together and to show other women (and ourselves) that it was possible to exist outside of marriage, the nuclear family or completely alone. Then we started becoming out of touch from and resented by women in other situations. The tension has grown to be unbearably great between many groups of women. I don't know that we can exist in splintered resentful factions. Yet , I know we will never progress if we hesitate or avoid speaking out against the politics of women we believe are wrong. There are a few things I believe are important to do now in order to not destroy the beginnings we have. I think people should continue working in support groups. Gay women should continue meeting together. People into child care should work to keep things together. Women into building and creating a women's culture (literature, lifestyles, art, music, etc.) should keep working. These types of work and rap groups and others are important for political development, support, and often survival. In addition we have got to begin talking and listening to women in every situation. We have to try to make these discussions as open, yet as un-threatening as possible. We have to do more consciousness raising about class, race, marriage, gay women, children, education, money -- everything that has been an underlying or obvious cause for our hassles. We haven't yet got the "perfect analysis". I think we have got to do a lot more talking, listening and thinking before we choose our sides. I just hope we still have the energy to do it. "That man over there say that a women needs to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helped me into carriages, or over mud puddles, or gives me a best place.. And ain't I a woman? Look at me Look at my arm ! I have plowed and planted and gathered into barns, and no man could head me. And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man when I could get it, and bear the last as well... And ain't I a woman? I have borned thirteen children and seen them most all sold off into slavery. And when I cried out with a mothers grief none but Jesus heard... And ain't I a woman? Sojurner Truth : Speech before the Woman's Right Convention at Akron Ohio in 1851 Your breath begins a greening in me, and a small leaf opens in the center of my hand [insert] As One We Must Move to End All Oppression COPIES OF THE POSTER ABOVE ARE AVAILABLE FOR $1.50 & A SELF ADDRESSED, STAMPED ENVELOPE FROM: THE WOMEN'S ACTION COMMITTEE BOC 7193 POWDERHORN STATION MINNEAPOLIS, MINN. 55407 2, Vol. 1 no 13, Ain't I
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PAINFUL TIMES Throughout the last year, people have been working hard at all sorts of productive work, general political analysis, support groups for gay women, child care, abortion, self-defense. Feminist publications are flourishing and women's living collectives and community centers have been growing in number. In spit of all of our accomplishments, many women have gone through some of the most difficult emotional struggles we've ever encountered, including the hassles we had in male-run politics and old personal relationships. In thinking back to the time when we were excitedly making plans for our new life styles and political activities it seems incredibly naive not to have been more realistic about anticipating hassles. In planning our work groups and living collectives we invisioned an environment relatively free from oppressive relationships, (old left semantic arguments and other things that retard (or make impossible) our struggle for radical change. Instead we found other problems -- gay women feeling oppressed by straight women, heterosexual and bi-sexual women feeling rejected by gay women, hostility between women of different classes, women with children feeling they have no place at all in women's liberation, charges of racism, painfully standing in the middle of two sisters you love who are fighting and feeling both of them are right ( or wrong), I've begun to think over some of the mistakes we made that have caused so many painful experiences. The only thing I'm sure about is that we were much too idealistic. We expected far too much from ourselves and our sisters in terms of how much we could change. We were unaware of how tight a grasp this society has on us. We were wrong in assuming we could all become perfect "post-revolutionary people" even before we've decided just what that might involve. We had such high expectations that every hurt and disappointment and failure was multiplied several times over. We must be careful not to give our sisters and ourselves false hopes of utopia in a feminist movement. We thought that because we are all women sharing the same oppression we could be easily united, that we were free from the pain we have felt before we came together. But that is not the way it is. (I still feel that as women with a Feminist consciousness, we have the potential and the responsibility to build a revolution.) We have run into some errors in our preconceptions about women working together. We assumed that because we were all females everything would work out well. Often, with that assumption in mind, we took less care in dealing with our sisters than we should have. People were hurt along the way. We were frustrated when we spoke with women whose politics were far from ours. Are "liberal" women our sisters or will they definitely be our enemies? Where do we draw the line? There may be a time when pacifism is definitely counter-revolutionary if it isn't already. Yet there are many female pacifists in the women's movement. We were angry when women from different lifestyles and with different experiences didn't understand us. We started women's collectives to live, to do political analysis together and to show other women (and ourselves) that it was possible to exist outside of marriage, the nuclear family or completely alone. Then we started becoming out of touch from and resented by women in other situations. The tension has grown to be unbearably great between many groups of women. I don't know that we can exist in splintered resentful factions. Yet , I know we will never progress if we hesitate or avoid speaking out against the politics of women we believe are wrong. There are a few things I believe are important to do now in order to not destroy the beginnings we have. I think people should continue working in support groups. Gay women should continue meeting together. People into child care should work to keep things together. Women into building and creating a women's culture (literature, lifestyles, art, music, etc.) should keep working. These types of work and rap groups and others are important for political development, support, and often survival. In addition we have got to begin talking and listening to women in every situation. We have to try to make these discussions as open, yet as un-threatening as possible. We have to do more consciousness raising about class, race, marriage, gay women, children, education, money -- everything that has been an underlying or obvious cause for our hassles. We haven't yet got the "perfect analysis". I think we have got to do a lot more talking, listening and thinking before we choose our sides. I just hope we still have the energy to do it. "That man over there say that a women needs to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helped me into carriages, or over mud puddles, or gives me a best place.. And ain't I a woman? Look at me Look at my arm ! I have plowed and planted and gathered into barns, and no man could head me. And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man when I could get it, and bear the last as well... And ain't I a woman? I have borned thirteen children and seen them most all sold off into slavery. And when I cried out with a mothers grief none but Jesus heard... And ain't I a woman? Sojurner Truth : Speech before the Woman's Right Convention at Akron Ohio in 1851 Your breath begins a greening in me, and a small leaf opens in the center of my hand [insert] As One We Must Move to End All Oppression COPIES OF THE POSTER ABOVE ARE AVAILABLE FOR $1.50 & A SELF ADDRESSED, STAMPED ENVELOPE FROM: THE WOMEN'S ACTION COMMITTEE BOC 7193 POWDERHORN STATION MINNEAPOLIS, MINN. 55407 2, Vol. 1 no 13, Ain't I
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