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

1971-07-02 "Ain't I a Woman?" Page 11

feminist movement I remember that we were all real concern was smashing unequal oppressive dependent power relations. Then Whethermen (a sexist male-dominated, military oriented organization) came out with a smash-monogamy-of-any-sort-line. And you could see a real change in the politics of the women’s movement.. cause I guess it felt it had to top any line about women that Whethermen put out.
   I have urged women to smash their monogamies lots of times. Their heterosexual monogamies. I did that because it is hard for me to conceive in this point of history anything very liberated happening between one man and one woman. I did that because it’s hard for me to understand why women with generally high consciousness spend their energies and intimate struggle with men. But I didn’t do it because the form of monogamy is somehow inherently destructive. Like I don’t think I meant smash those relationships, or smash the bad parts of them. It’s not the intensity, the monogy of relationship that makes or breaks it…it’s the content of the relationship.
   When Weatherman said smash monogamy they meant that each woman should put out for lots of boys instead of just one. That’s not exactly my idea of the road to liberation. What we really want to smash is domination, stifling possessiveness, manipulation, brutality, etc. and those things turn up all the time and all kinds of relationships from the most casual to the most intense.
   I guess dogma is a way not to deal with the actualities of our lives. When your main concern is smashing monogamy, that leaves a lot of different kinds of relationships that don’t get scrutinized and criticized so much. When you attack women for being macho because it scares you, you don’t deal with your own timidity, your own oppression.
   I am involved, as you might guess, in a very intense, close monogamous relationship. And a lot of my freinds in the movement have been laying down subtle criticisms of that. But so far, no one has really been upset about the monogamy. It’s an excuse for other things. Like some people have been upset because I haven’t seen them much and instead of saying they miss me and feel rejected, they say smash monogamy. Some of my sisters feel threatened by my being closer to Wendy than with them. Some straight women feel very freaked out that two women can actually love each other with such intensity. These straight women are really uptight, because they criticize us on the basis of ‘correct’ ideas they got from their heterosexual experiences, as if those ideas could possibly relate to our Lavender Vision. Moreover, when they see two women really digging each other, then they know lesbianism is for REAL and they get a bit scared that it might zap in on them.
   One of the reasons people give for their ‘smash monogamy’ line is that collectivity is better than individuality. They say that it is better to get your sense of identity and security from a group of close sisters than from just one person. Well, in the last few years in the women’s movement, I have not seen too many collectives provide any kind of stable support for any individual. I was in a very tight disciplined, close collective all last year and looking back at it now, I can’t remember a time in my life that I felt so weak and so dependent. Instead of being dependent on one person, I was dependent on the ‘collective’.. not really on the other women in the collective, just on the collective. But the ‘collective’ didn’t exist on its own, outside of being made up of all of us. And because everything was so fucking ‘collective’ we never really were able to build relationships inside it which gave us what we needed.
   I also haven’t seen many collectives that last too long. The form is an experimental one. Although my collective last year was the most important political experience I ever had, second to coming out, I took a lot of losses in it. We all did. I’m not too sure how I feel about collectives, but I’ll never throw myself, lose myself, in one again like I did last year.
   With Wendy I feel very secure. It gives me a lot of strength to be very certain of being loved. I have never done good politics [of] lived a nice life except when I was feeling good and strong. And being a lesbian in this society requires a lot of strength.
   Until there is actually some form which looks better to me, not in theory or fantasy..but in concrete practice than my monogamous relationship with Wendy, I don’t see why I should smash monogamy. Although I [souldn’t] have said this last year, I now foresee a post-revolutionary situation where a whole spectrum of forms exist, all sorts of numbers, all sorts of different levels of collectivity. I’m not going to give up the best relationship of my life because in the context of the straight women’s movement I developed a theory which gains the goods for me, not one which requires I strip myself of the few things which make me feel good. Since I came out and since I got into self-defense, I’ve never felt better about myself. For me, macho and monogamy have been the wonder drugs that my women’s consciousness has produced, to defend against a virus of dogma.
Reprinted from
Lavender Vision
c/o Media Center
2 Brookline St.
Cambridge, Mass. 02138
5c/copy & postage

[photo to right - International Women's Calendar]

TAMI KALLEN
My Mother
   When she was little she had tough life, she worked very hard, she lived very hard. The first 5 yrs of her life she was very skinny & dying. But thank heavens she lived and soon she got chubby. Soon when she was in her teens she went on dates with boy & girl friends. Later on she met my father, she then married him and
turn over
was heterosexual. She had me & my brother. She and my daddy in 1967 separated. She still had heterosexual relationships with men. Early March she met Donna & they loved each other & made love and was a lesbian.
The end

Reprinted from Dykes For An Amerikan Revolution - D.C.
Easter Day Press

a Woman?  July 2, 1971   11.

Saving...

feminist movement I remember that we were all real concern was smashing unequal oppressive dependent power relations. Then Whethermen (a sexist male-dominated, military oriented organization) came out with a smash-monogamy-of-any-sort-line. And you could see a real change in the politics of the women’s movement.. cause I guess it felt it had to top any line about women that Whethermen put out. I have urged women to smash their monogamies lots of times. Their heterosexual monogamies. I did that because it is hard for me to conceive in this point of history anything very liberated happening between one man and one woman. I did that because it’s hard for me to understand why women with generally high consciousness spend their energies and intimate struggle with men. But I didn’t do it because the form of monogamy is somehow inherently destructive. Like I don’t think I meant smash those relationships, or smash the bad parts of them. It’s not the intensity, the monogy of relationship that makes or breaks it…it’s the content of the relationship. When Weatherman said smash monogamy they meant that each woman should put out for lots of boys instead of just one. That’s not exactly my idea of the road to liberation. What we really want to smash is domination, stifling possessiveness, manipulation, brutality, etc. and those things turn up all the time and all kinds of relationships from the most casual to the most intense. I guess dogma is a way not to deal with the actualities of our lives. When your main concern is smashing monogamy, that leaves a lot of different kinds of relationships that don’t get scrutinized and criticized so much. When you attack women for being macho because it scares you, you don’t deal with your own timidity, your own oppression. I am involved, as you might guess, in a very intense, close monogamous relationship. And a lot of my freinds in the movement have been laying down subtle criticisms of that. But so far, no one has really been upset about the monogamy. It’s an excuse for other things. Like some people have been upset because I haven’t seen them much and instead of saying they miss me and feel rejected, they say smash monogamy. Some of my sisters feel threatened by my being closer to Wendy than with them. Some straight women feel very freaked out that two women can actually love each other with such intensity. These straight women are really uptight, because they criticize us on the basis of ‘correct’ ideas they got from their heterosexual experiences, as if those ideas could possibly relate to our Lavender Vision. Moreover, when they see two women really digging each other, then they know lesbianism is for REAL and they get a bit scared that it might zap in on them. One of the reasons people give for their ‘smash monogamy’ line is that collectivity is better than individuality. They say that it is better to get your sense of identity and security from a group of close sisters than from just one person. Well, in the last few years in the women’s movement, I have not seen too many collectives provide any kind of stable support for any individual. I was in a very tight disciplined, close collective all last year and looking back at it now, I can’t remember a time in my life that I felt so weak and so dependent. Instead of being dependent on one person, I was dependent on the ‘collective’.. not really on the other women in the collective, just on the collective. But the ‘collective’ didn’t exist on its own, outside of being made up of all of us. And because everything was so fucking ‘collective’ we never really were able to build relationships inside it which gave us what we needed. I also haven’t seen many collectives that last too long. The form is an experimental one. Although my collective last year was the most important political experience I ever had, second to coming out, I took a lot of losses in it. We all did. I’m not too sure how I feel about collectives, but I’ll never throw myself, lose myself, in one again like I did last year. With Wendy I feel very secure. It gives me a lot of strength to be very certain of being loved. I have never done good politics [of] lived a nice life except when I was feeling good and strong. And being a lesbian in this society requires a lot of strength. Until there is actually some form which looks better to me, not in theory or fantasy..but in concrete practice than my monogamous relationship with Wendy, I don’t see why I should smash monogamy. Although I [souldn’t] have said this last year, I now foresee a post-revolutionary situation where a whole spectrum of forms exist, all sorts of numbers, all sorts of different levels of collectivity. I’m not going to give up the best relationship of my life because in the context of the straight women’s movement I developed a theory which gains the goods for me, not one which requires I strip myself of the few things which make me feel good. Since I came out and since I got into self-defense, I’ve never felt better about myself. For me, macho and monogamy have been the wonder drugs that my women’s consciousness has produced, to defend against a virus of dogma. Reprinted from Lavender Vision c/o Media Center 2 Brookline St. Cambridge, Mass. 02138 5c/copy & postage [photo to right - International Women's Calendar] TAMI KALLEN My Mother When she was little she had tough life, she worked very hard, she lived very hard. The first 5 yrs of her life she was very skinny & dying. But thank heavens she lived and soon she got chubby. Soon when she was in her teens she went on dates with boy & girl friends. Later on she met my father, she then married him and turn over was heterosexual. She had me & my brother. She and my daddy in 1967 separated. She still had heterosexual relationships with men. Early March she met Donna & they loved each other & made love and was a lesbian. The end Reprinted from Dykes For An Amerikan Revolution - D.C. Easter Day Press a Woman? July 2, 1971 11.