dani ([info]_allecto_) wrote,
@ 2008-01-14 20:42:00
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Clemetine's courageous article and my rather cheeky response
SUNDAY MAIL columnist CLEMENTINE FORD reveals she had not one but two abortions - and that it was a really, really easy decision without guilt or shame.

Clementine, you are an incredible, brave and amazing woman to stand up and put yourself out there for the rights of women and children everywhere. I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your courage, strength and commitment to women's social, emotional and political integrity. If only more women had your courage. "I am very much pro-life. I'm pro the life of women who have lived for years as opposed to cells that have lived for weeks. I am in favour of women having babies when and if they choose them." I am 100% with you there, sister. Incidentally, I am a lesbian separatist, who chooses to have nothing to do with men and their supremacy. I have found that refusing intercourse with men is an even better way than condoms, of ensuring that one does not get pregnant. Instead of 'birth contol' which is usually risky to women's health and never 100% effective, I believe that the pro-lifers would be better served by promoting lesbianism. Just my two cents.

Love and sisterhood to you Clementine. Stay strong.

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[info]fatty_bumsticks
2008-01-16 08:07 am UTC (link)
Clementine has a blog too, which I really love. I don't know whether you've found it.

http://audreyapple.blogspot.com/


Rachel

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[info]_allecto_
2008-01-17 11:19 am UTC (link)
I had a look at her blog and I quite like it but I think she is a bit too liberal feminist (lipstick feminist) for my tastes. And some of the posts she made were either downright offensive or ignorant. For example the post where she linked to a youtube video called 'Big Girls'. That video and it's messages were fucked in my opinion. And also her discussion on queer marriages. She didn't even acknowledge that there are those of us in the feminist movement who want an end to all marriage. So, yeah, I think she leaves a lot to be desired with her blog. But still, I admire her guts and her willingness to put herself out there as a feminist.

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[info]fatty_bumsticks
2008-01-17 12:31 pm UTC (link)
I think the blog is aimed at being easy-to-read and entertaining and light-hearted to a certain degree (to read and to write, I assume), which makes the liberal feminist ideology easier for those I'm Not A Feminist But... people to understand and identify with rather than straight-out rad fem. Months back when I started reading her blog the message towards some aspects of gender politics was "Isn't this a bit shit?" and now it's more "I'm a feminist, and this is REALLY shit", so maybe she's gained confidence with what she writes in a blog style from the readership response that she's gained.

I don't think people can escape ignorance all of the time in someone else's eyes - there's always going to be something to be disagreed with, that's just the way that people are.
I imagine that I'd be quite easily be labelled as too liberal as a feminist, and a liberal feminist like me would look at a rad fem and wonder at the point of being so rigidly exclusive with what can be said and done and believed (aren't we trying to get people to accept feminism and spread the word?).


Rachel

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[info]_allecto_
2008-01-17 01:30 pm UTC (link)
I'm glad that you like her blog and that you get something out of what she has to say. I never said that her blog was worthless or boring or anything like that. There are many women out there who are attracted by her writing and take on things. Fair enough. I will support women like her as sisters when they do something courageous, like Clemetine did.

But I get frustrated by women thinking that men who sexualise women who might have an inch of fat on their bodies, are feminist. That's completely wrong. I also get frustrated by ignorance. Especially around issues of lesbianism and spinsterhood. That post on queer marriage showed a complete lack of understanding about lesbian feminism. And I'm allowed to not want to read it.

I can not be ignorant about the realities of heterosexual women's lives. I work with heterosexual women, I work with the children of heterosexual women, I organise activism with heterosexual women, I have friendships with heterosexual women. It is unavoidable to me to not know about what affects heterosexual women. My activism reflects what I know about heterosexual women's lives. If I didn't know about heterosexual women I would find out. So, I am allowed to be frustrated by heterosexual feminist disinterest in lesbian feminist analysis.

What I said was that she was too liberal feminist for my tastes. I am not all that interested in reading her blog until she has a better understanding of lesbian feminism and size acceptance. If you like her less radical feminist position, then I cast no aspersions on you.

I am not trying to get people to accept feminism and spread the word. I am trying to create a small bubble of sisterhood and sanity in this world where women are routinely raped and slaughtered by men. I want to change the world and to do that I am willing to make compromises but not at the expense of my integrity. I encounter enough frustrating things in real life, the net is my safe space.

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(Anonymous)
2008-01-16 03:22 pm UTC (link)
Allecto,

Thanks for this. I followed your link to her article and posted a cheering reply.

She raises the important issue of the public shaming of women. I see the rise of p*rnography as very much linked to the rise of anti-abortion sentiment. Each of them succeeds through endless expressions of shame directed toward females.

Each of them supports the other in denying any respect whatsoever for the adult female body, and in creating a social context in which females are the public and private property of males - never our own individual property.

Mary Sunshine

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[info]_allecto_
2008-01-17 11:24 am UTC (link)
I see the rise of p*rnography as very much linked to the rise of anti-abortion sentiment. Each of them succeeds through endless expressions of shame directed toward females.

Hmm... I had ever linked this together before but I think you're right. The more sexually enslaved we are, the greater are the attacks on our reproductive freedoms. And yes we are merely property for men, everything in our society reinforces this message. Every social structure enforces our bondage.

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