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From: daemon@decwrl.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: 
Message-ID: <4982@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 16-Jan-84 11:27:38 EST
Article-I.D.: decwrl.4982
Posted: Mon Jan 16 11:27:38 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 17-Jan-84 02:06:22 EST
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From: swshub::obelix::ruthr
Subject: in defense of separatism, a response to saquigley

 

Thank you for your submission.  It's sad, isn't it, than even in\

Net.women, feminism is not only not an axiom, it's sometimes necessary

to feel defensive about calling oneself a feminist.

I want to go one step further, and to defend separatism as a valid, sometimes

necessary choice for women, lesbian or not.

I feel that there is a lot of woman hating in this society.  It's manifested

in many ways--advertisements (who could forget the famolare shoe commercials

showing pistols and jackhammers pointed -by men- at women's naked oiled legs),

jeers from men on street corners as one passes by, the 'she only got the

job/promotion/award/schoarship because they needed the affirmative action 

numbers' one always hears when a woman gains something at work or school.

 
I know that when I recognized that coming at me, in every direction,

made me very angry for a while, and I turned that anger at men in general--

and I do not feel that that was totally unjustified, since I know almost

know men who are as aware of that oppression we face as most women are,

and therefore are unwitting cooperators in that oppression.

 
In order for me to function at my job, in order to gain some sense of

my self as an independent person, to get some confidence in my skills,

it was necessary for me to be separatist for several years.  I did not

hate all men, though I had anger that was likely to manifest itself at

any men I came in contact with--I merely did not have very much to do with

men.  I did not break off relationships with those men who were already my friends, but I did not put any energy into new friendships with men.

After several years, I moved into a household that had men and women in it--

but I would not have been able to do that had there not been womanspace

two blocks from my home.  

 
I live with men now, I have men friends as well as women friends, I have

a male lover--I have allowed men into almost all parts of my life--

but I still need womanspace, a place I can go and know that the people there

will all have shared that essential oppression that has shaped my experiences

like no others have, where I can be safe from sexist violence, where people

will not say "she only got x because she's a woman", where I can find the

release from pressures I need to get the energy I need to go back and

keep working and living in a sexist world.  

 
Separatism is not just a product of anger, but a resource to provide the

energy to face the world.  

 
Responses welcomed--

Ruth Radetsky

...decvax!decwrl!rhea!swshub!ruthr