rebecca: rmott, rmott62 or Rebecca.

pisaquari: Site(s) you blog? If any?

rebecca: rmott62.wordpress .

pisaquari: Places you most frequent/comment (can be nonfeminist)

rebecca: Abyss2Hope, Women’s Lives Matters & Women’s Life Matters, Gordon Poisons, Genderberg, Women’s Space and Chicks Dig Me. I comment mainly on Women’s Space.

pisaquari: How would you describe your background? Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

rebecca: I get quite confused by my background for in some ways I am highly privileged, but I that I have privilege can mean little or nothing. I am white upper-middle-class English, with all those advantages and baggage, and also quarter American. My family from America were a bigger influence on me than the English part, but that is because they strive to be good people, whilst much of the shit in my life came the Englsh part of my family. I have found the major part of having my background is that when I attempted to get help after many years of severe male sexual, mental and physical violence, I was disbelieved because I did not fit the narrow profile of a proper “victim”. Especially if I mentioned that I may of been prostituted. This makes very angry, for sometimes it feels like it is just words saying “all women can be abused”. But when face with a woman/girl who is desperate for any help but happens to be “posh”, she is often shown the door. My background did not save me from being raped and mentally abused by my stepdad for 15 years. It did not save me from being used as real-life porn in prostitution. It did not stopped the date rapes. Instead, I know many of the men doing the raping and torturing had an added thrill to degrade the posh girl. These are things I am scared to express, but it makes very sceptical. One good thing of my background is that I was brought up with all the arts, including films, novels and going arts exhibitions. My English/Scottish grandmother run a ballet company. The arts was a wonderful escape from my reality.

pisaquari: How did male supremacy first touch you?

rebecca: Meeting my stepdad was meeting male supremacy. I think I round 5, I was first “raped” by him when I was 6. That first rape was what made me a feminist. It give me anger that had no place to go. I encountered grief which I could not understand. I found I could not stop him however I behaved. It was very confusing to me, coz up to that point I never feared men, coz I had only known respect and love till that point. I had felt fear, but that was from my mother. Male supremacy was rammed into me when I forced to view or was read hard-core porn. That destroy any hope, and give me lessons that I was just there for sex, and that I will recieve pain and be degraded. I like my feminism to remember the clear eyes of that girl who was shocked that there could so much hate out there. And wanted so much to believe in hope.

pisaquari: Were there any feminists closely involved in your upbringing?

rebecca: The most important “feminist” in my life was my American grandmother. She a very strong and independent woman. She lived single for most of her life, her marriage was round 20 years, and during the WW2 she went back to Denver, whilst my grandfather was in England on the Home Guard. She was an artist. She was heavily in human’s rights and the civil right’s movements, which was very inspiring to me. It can from a place of liberal Christianity, which is something I have a lot of respect for. Many of female relatives are involved with work with the community, human’s rights or others forms of reaching out to others. I feel my “feminism” comes from Christian liberal tradition. Although I an atheist, I do have a lot of respect for that part of my background. I do read some feminist books, but not if the language is too academic or distancing itself from the reality that women’s lives that refuse to fit into simple boxes. Personally, I find most of what is written or said about the reality of living inside the sex trade is very patronising or distancing. Sometimes it can feel like being a lab rat when you speak out as an exited prostitute. I have enjoyed reading Melissa Farley, I respect Liz Kelly and Nikki Craft. Of course, there is Andrea Dworkin, but I am pretty sick of the worshipping of her. Most exited women from the sex trade would not named themselves as “feminists”, but when they speak or write of their realities, their voices are the most radical feminist voices I have ever come across. They have lived inside male hatred and be on the receiving end of male violence. In their voices there is often a clear-eyed view of living on the front-line of a war on all women. I don’t care if they are feminist or not.

pisaquari: Was there an “aha” moment for you for feminism? For radical feminism?

rebecca: I am not sure if I had an “aha” moment, just a steady awareness that my life not natural. I remember being in a workshop “studying” porn. What struck me was how cold and detached I was seeing porn, when other women were shocked, sickened and saddened by it. I realise that I was “used” to porn, and saw maybe that was not the norm. I had moments in prostitution, when I could look down onto myself. I would view my degradation, my posing like I was inside “Hustler”. I would see that I should be in pain, and observed I was feeling very little. In these brief moments, I knew this what not natural. Even as a kid, I had a rage that thought how dare my stepdad think I was his sex toy.

pisaquari: What attributes in your personality/upbringing do you think made you more open to radical feminism?

rebecca: There was always a part of me that had resistance. Mostly it keep in silence. It was keep inside of me until I was safe enough to express my rage and to show how much damage I had been forced to live with. I think my detachment keep me safe. It also made into a writer and an artist. Many times, when I was on the recieving of extreme male sexual, physical and mental violence, a very detached part of me would be thinking – one day I will make a record of this. Part of my resistance is an refusual to forget. When I write I write as a witness to the war against women. Partly through my background in Quakerism, I tend to believe that men choose to be violence to women and children. The men that do that I hate with a passion, but only them – I tend to give most people the benefit of the doubt. I will not hate a mass of people, I will hate and condemn the men that have made the choice to destroy lives.

pisaquari: Do you call yourself a radical feminist to others?

rebecca: I find it hard having any label put on me. It always seemed that I resist belonging to any group. I will say I am radical feminist when speaking about the sex trade with people that see no problems with it. I mainly say I am a feminist. But after having living a lifetime of being roles for others, I now hate being put into any box that take away that I am more complicated then that. I have a terrible habit of once a label is put onto me, I do something that is way outside that box.

pisaquari: How do you integrate radical feminism into your personal relationships? Buying habits? Love? Family?

rebecca: I am not sure how much I integrate feminism into my life. It is behind everything I write or put into my art, but at the same time I need to feel free to question everyone’s attitudes to survivors of the sex trade, including radical feminists. I am very un-pc in my pleasures, such as TV, sports and films. To very honest, I find much of feminism too smug or earnest to be a pleasure. I use my pleasures to escape, so I really don’t care too much. On a more serious level, It is part of my personal politics to let women who lived inside of hell to find pleasure and joy by any means that will bring them back to their true selves. My essence love Hollywood films, eat all food, want to live in huge cities, enjoy TV, watch sports. I take these things, and I do not lose my intelligence, I do not forget the reality of male hate and violence. No, I do both, I fulfil my need to be a person who refuses to put ito easy catorgories. It is my resistence after being made into nothing for too much of my life.

pisaquari: What has been the hardest part of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

rebecca: I find hard to make radical feminism part of my life, because of my resistence to belonging. I am scared of being made into a role again. Also, I get worried that some radical feminist have patronising attitudes to the voices of exited women from the sex trade. Sometimes, keeping them in the victim-role, and not seeing the massive strength and powerful radical words they are saying. Or into the role of the “heroic” woman who speak out against the sex trade, but then disappoints by doing non-feminist stuff. I worry about tokenism when I speak out about the sex trade, I don’t like the way Andrea Dworkin was put on a pedestral. I always run away if that is happening to me.

pisaquari: How do you survive/find happiness living in a patriarchy? What are some things you like to do?

rebecca: I survive by finding what gives my essence pleasure, and much of it is not feminist. I have let myself be a film addict, watch dramas on TV, follow sports I love. All these things give me back my life. I feel my work is bringing my self back, and that is the hardest thing in the world. So I relax whenever I can.

pisaquari: What sort of activist activities are you involved with?

rebecca: My writing is my activism. As I have very severe PTSD, that is the most I can do. Through my blogs, I have made connects with some amazing women even in the sex trade or exited. I feel that my conversations or emails with them is very much part of my activism. I do support some children’s charities, mainly ones that campaign round homelessness, trafficking, under-aged prostitution and working with teenagers.

pisaquari: Okay, so there is a radical feminist island–you are there right now: what are you doing?

rebecca: I don’t know how long I would stay on an island for radical feminists, or whether I would be looking longingly for a ship to get me back to any city. I would feel I didn’t fit in, especially if I caught out trying to get some meat.

Nine Deuce:I’d explain what that name means, but then it’d lose its aura of mystery.

pisaquari: Site(s) you blog? If any?

Nine Deuce: Rage Against the Man-chine, my radical feminist blog with the name that’s like an echo-chamber of irony. That’s it — I think I cuss too much to work on anything collaborative.

pisaquari: Places you most frequent/comment (can be nonfeminist)

Nine Deuce: Your site, Jenn’s (XXBlaze), L’s (Editorializing the Editors), Twisty’s, Crankosaur’s, miss Andreas, basically everyone on my blogroll, and a few stupid websites that I’m too embarrassed to mention here.

pisaquari: How would you describe your background? Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

Nine Deuce: I grew up in what might be called an upper middle class family, which I suppose means I suffer from a few of the delusions brought about by class privilege, though I do my best to be aware of that. I’m also white, able-bodied, and educated, all of which make life a lot easier than it otherwise might be. But my background is a bit difficult to characterize. My parents come from blue/periwinkle collar backgrounds, and no one in my family had ever gone to college before I did (most of them never even graduated from high school), so they’ve got a decidedly non-patrician worldview in spite of having managed some financial success. Like most upwardly-mobile Americans, they think they’ve done it all themselves and tend toward Libertarianism or California-style Republicanism (though I think my uber-liberalness is rubbing off on a few of them). I suppose I’d say my family is about as bourgeois as a family can be without becoming pretentious. Now that I’m in grad school, maybe I can add that element of pretentiousness to the mix and make us really obnoxious.

As for the oppressions I face, I’m female. That means my chief value lies in who wants to do me, right? I’m probably more nervous when I’m walking around outside at night than I ought to have to be, and I have to deal with men’s creepy/scary behavior more often than I think is reasonable. Everywhere I go I’m confronted with the message that women exist to serve as decorations and sex objects, and the message that I’m blowing it as a human being if I don’t look and act like a Bratz doll. I could go on, but I’ll leave that there. I don’t particularly relish enumerating the ways in which I am oppressed because I don’t feel like I have it all that rough in relative terms. I mean, all women have to deal with oppression to some degree, and all of the oppressions we face are a part of the same overarching system. But there are a lot of women and children in the world right now who are being beaten, raped, and killed, so discussing the ways in which I personally am oppressed embarrasses me a little.

pisaquari: How did male supremacy first touch you?

Nine Deuce: It’s always there, isn’t it? But I remember the first time I noticed it. When I was little one of my aunts used to yell at me to come and do the dishes after holiday meals. All of the women in my family would be in the kitchen cleaning the dishes while the men watched football, and I thought it was bullshit. I asked my aunt why the women had to do the dishes when they had cooked everything, and she told me it was because the men worked and so they deserved to rest. I thought that was kind of an odd answer since she lived alone and worked full-time, so I asked why she wasn’t in the other room watching football, and she had no answer for me. I immediately stopped participating in holiday dish-washing. I still get shit for it every year at Thanksgiving, at which time I give everyone a windbaggish speech and tell the retired men in the living room to get off their asses and do the dishes while us working women sit around and drink (I hate football). It never works and I just end up sitting with the men rolling my eyes at the TV.

pisaquari: Were there any feminists closely involved in your upbringing?

Nine Deuce: Not really. There were a lot of bad-ass women around, but they weren’t specifically feminist in the sense that they discussed gender issues. It was more likely to take the form of them telling men who tried to order them around to go fuck themselves.

pisaquari: Was there an “aha” moment for you for feminism? For radical feminism?

Nine Deuce: I can’t remember experiencing one big satori, but rather a string of incidents in which I found people’s expectations illogical, restrictive and/or enraging. Before adolescence I could often be heard bemoaning the injustice of my being excluded from activities I found more interesting than playing with dolls because I was a girl. In junior high and high school I started getting pissed off by the sexual double standard girls faced and by the insane pressure to conform to the beauty standards of people I wanted nothing to do with. It was also in my first few years of high school that I had my first exposure to hardcore porn and to the rampant sexual harassment and assault that seem to saturate the lives of young people. I started seeing young men get possessive and controlling in relationships, I had friends whose boyfriends became violent and sexually abusive, and I had a few weird experiences of my own, all of which led me to the view that there was something seriously wrong with the way that we were being raised to view the world and other people.

I didn’t really put all of that together until I was older, but it all sort of cohered gradually for me when I was in my early 20s. I don’t even think I ever called myself a radical feminist until a few years ago because I didn’t really know what that meant. I’d never read any radical feminist theory, or any feminist theory at all for that matter, but rather had arrived at this point at which I felt like the only sane person in a world full of porn-crazed, misogynistic psychopaths. I didn’t really know what to call it. It was pretty lonely until I wandered around on the internet a few years ago and figured out that there were other women (and even a few men) out there who were thinking and writing about the things I was thinking about and calling it radical feminism.

pisaquari: What attributes in your personality/upbringing do you think made you more open to radical feminism?

Nine Deuce: My parents had almost no expectations of me with regard to fulfilling a gender role. I identified strongly with my dad when I was little, and my mom is pretty resistant to enforced femininity. I suppose they rubbed off on me, and whether they did so consciously or not, they refused to allow my childhood to revolve around aspiring to be a Barbie. I had Barbies and baby dolls, but I also had chemistry sets, microscopes, Garbage Pail Kids, and a skateboard. In fact, I got bored with dolls really easily and ended up cutting their hair and coloring it with markers to turn them into punk rockers so I could stage concerts. I don’t pretend to have been some supremely insightful child, but I think I instinctively recognized how limiting and boring the femininity path was and decided to skip it. So, I ended up becoming what people call a tomboy.

I seem to have been predisposed to iconoclasm and rebelliousness, however superficially that might have expressed itself at times. I spent my high school years being pissed off and hating everything in between dyeing my hair and shopping for punk and indie rock records. I won’t pretend that that scene is or was free of gender expectations or sexism, but I think identifying with a counterculture that tended to look askance at received “wisdom” was probably a big factor in my developing feminism and radicalism. When I was young I basically assumed anything anyone told me was bullshit/stupid/uncool, which is silly and pretentious, and really kind of funny, but I think it served me well in the end.

pisaquari: Do you call yourself a radical feminist to others?

Nine Deuce: I do to people I know really well, but not to people I’ve just met. I usually wait until I’m sure someone will understand what that means before I toss the term around. It’s unfortunately quite easy for even well-intentioned people to misunderstand what radical feminism is all about, so I hold off on having the conversation until I find out someone is thoughtful enough to get it. The thing is, I don’t think radical feminism is all that radical in the sense that most people think of that term. Sure, it’s radical in the sense that it aims to transform the root or foundation of the gender system, but the idea that women are human beings and that gender roles exist to the detriment of human freedom and expression isn’t quite so scary to most thoughtful people once they really give it some consideration. It’s just hard to figure out who is and isn’t willing to think about it and to devise the right approach to the subject.

pisaquari: How do you integrate radical feminism into your personal relationships? Buying habits? Love? Family?

Nine Deuce: I’m not the kind of person who needs to have a ton of acquaintances, which is fortunate since I tend to write people off pretty quickly when they show themselves to not be amenable to thinking. I assume that anyone who is willing to think about things will see the cracks and contradictions in prescribed gender roles, and I’ve found that to be true with the people I consider to be my friends.

Most of my friends are male for whatever reason, but they’re all well aware of my views on anything and everything having to do with feminism (maybe to their annoyance at times). A lot of them send me e-mails or call me with things they’ve witnessed that they thought were sexist, which I think is kind of cool. Actually, it’s odd to me that my female friends are less likely to engage in discussions of feminism with me than my male friends are. I’m often bothered by how difficult it is for me to find women to be friends with. It seems like a contradiction: how can I be a radical feminist and have such a hard time finding women I indentify with? I suppose I can put it down to the fact that I don’t have a lot in common with women who don’t see anything wrong with the current idea of what it means to be female. Still, it sucks.

I think I’ve been lucky in that my family, while they might think I’m insane at times, are supportive of my radical feminism and are even willing to discuss it with me here and there. That includes my 67-year-old dad, who might just be buying into my claim that anyone with a daughter who isn’t a feminist ally is an asshole.

As for the love question, I’m fairly certain that I’m going to have to deal with being a radical feminist heterosexual forever, and I’ve thought a lot about it. I used to worry that I’d pondered myself into a permanent state of singledom, but that’s changed. I’ve figured out that the kinds of dudes I’m interested in knowing tend to be attracted to women who think of themselves as human beings and expect to be treated as such. And that I’d rather be single forever than date someone who doesn’t think I’m a human being. Call me a weirdo. I know there are probably more Axe-wearers than dudes who can understand and appreciate the tenets of radical feminism on this planet, but they exist. I won’t pretend that a lifetime of social conditioning doesn’t leave an imprint behind, but I think smart women and smart men can figure out ways to have healthy relationships despite how crass and stupid our culture’s ideas about sex and love have become. I certainly won’t ever entertain the possibility of compromising my feminist beliefs (I mean, how does one compromise on the idea that women are human beings?), but I have no problem discussing them with someone who actually wants to understand them, and I know enough of those that I’m not completely despondent about the fate of the human race.

As for buying habits, I’m too broke to make much of an impact, but I do avoid any brand that employs overt objectification in its ads. I’d like to say I avoid buying products that are made in sweatshops, but I think that might be impossible without buying that hipster bullshit from American Apparel and giving a share of my scarce resources to the world’s premier sexual harasser. That’s one of my biggest problems: how do I live in the world responsibly when there’s no way to meet my daily needs without contributing indirectly to the oppression of women and children? It’s sometimes easier to figure out how to avoid harming animals with one’s consumer choices than it is to figure out how to avoid hurting people.

pisaquari: What has been the hardest part of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

Nine Deuce: Figuring out how to get through daily life without exploding with frustration and/or anger, and figuring out how to avoid buying products from companies that bank on objectifying and dehumanizing women. It’s almost impossible to walk ten feet on a Manhattan sidewalk without tripping over a steaming pile of misogyny, so it takes some effort to prevent myself from falling into a constant state of despondency. I don’t want to give my money to industries or corporations that exist only to the detriment of women, which means I avoid beauty products, high fashion, and the other obvious culprits. But it seems like every goddamned corporation in the world has a porn division or owns a publishing house that puts out its own ladmag, so it’s frustrating. It’d be nice to move to a co-op farm or something, where I could make, grow, or barter for everything I need, but I’m not into jam bands so I’m afraid it wouldn’t work.

pisaquari: How do you survive/find happiness living in a patriarchy? What are some things you like to do?

Nine Deuce: I avoid discussing gender issues with people who aren’t likely to be willing to consider anything beyond what they’ve learned from Spike TV, which saves me some aggravation. It took me a long time to learn that some people are never going to get it, no matter how clean and irrefutable my arguments may be. I also tend to treat everything like a joke; I find that approaching the assholery I witness in my daily life as if I’m watching the shenanigans of the arrogant boyfriend character from your average 80s teen movie relieves a lot of my weltschmerz.

I don’t really have many hobbies besides my blog and walking around New York because I spend about 85 hours a week on schoolwork and teaching. When I have time off, I like to travel for more than a month at a time to places where I can get malaria, dive, and see monkeys. If I didn’t spend all my time at home on schoolwork and teaching, I’d read more books that I choose for myself, I’d probably write a novel or some short stories, and I’d learn how to do a few really random and ostentatious things, like do ikebana or play the trombone. I’d also spend more time on things that are of actual benefit to the world, like volunteering at a shelter for women and children or a rape crisis center. Oh, and I’d really step up my radical feminist vandalism activities.

pisaquari: What sort of activist activities are you involved with?

Nine Deuce: I unfortunately don’t do as much as I’d like to. I write my blog, which I hope makes some kind of difference, but that’s about it.

pisaquari: Okay, so there is a radical feminist island–you are there right now: what are you doing?

Nine Deuce: I’m sitting on the beach eating unlimited free pineapple and drinking beer that tastes like flowers with my friends, a mixed bunch. We all get along because we don’t have to think of each other as adversaries in the competition for social status or male attention. Cosmopolitan doesn’t exist on the island, nor do rape, prostitution, porn, high heels, laser hair removal, plastic surgery, cellulite cream, nail polish, eyelash curlers, corsets, nylon stockings of any kind, diet products, make-up, or Family Guy (oh, sorry, I got carried away and thought this was a fantasy island). No one on the island has a preconceived idea about what the trajectory of our lives should look like; whether we have children, what shape a family will take, and what ages we choose to do things at are all ours to decide. We eat whatever we want, we exercise if we want to and don’t if we don’t (and if we do, then we’re doing it for our health). We wander around all day without being told we ought to be thinking about sex, whether we’re doing it right/enough/with the right people, or whether we ought to be ashamed of ourselves because of how/with whom/where we do it. It’s a pretty rad place.

It made sense that these stories would have their own place–not lost in one post of one Carnival. Each takes it’s own twists, with different emphasis on different life events. Some were conducted over e-mail, others late night chats or forum. Questions followed a loose interview outline to the extent they reflected each person’s story. I’ve maintained as much of the author’s original voice as possible–phrasing, grammar, punctuation style.

Thank you a million times over to the wimmin who offered their time and shared their stories. Your unique perspectives fascinate me as I’m sure they will others.

In no particular order, I present you: Amy,  Allecto, BBB, Maggie, Samantha Berg, Demonista, Julia, Amananta, and Jenn.

Amy: Amy’s Brain Today is my main identity. I also used to be maine_amy on some feminist boards, and sometimes I still use radfemlezzie.

pisaquari: Site(s) you blog? If any?

Amy: Feminist Reprise.

pisaquari: Places you most frequent/comment (can be nonfeminist)

Amy: I regularly read:

My Perspective (JusticeWalks) (unfortunately recently deleted)

Speaking Up, An Atheist Woman

Screaming Into the Void (Amananta)

Buried Alive (Pisaquari)

Well, I’ll Go to the Foot of My Stairs (Witchy-Woo)

Scrappy Badger

(And you all need to blog more often by the way!) I get around to some other blogs/sites less frequently (feminist and otherwise).

pisaquari: How would you describe your background? Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

Amy: I come from a rural white protestant working-class family in a very white area of New England. I am assimilated middle class now. I went to a Seven Sisters undergraduate college, have a master’s degree and a professional certification so I have significant educational privilege. I live in the US Southwest, where I make about $18,000 per year doing a clerical job. I’m in the middle of changing careers to work that is a bit more creative, and I’m having more success at that than I expected. I’m in an age-privileged position right now, old enough to be taken seriously, but not old.

I came out as a lesbian in college, in a very lesbian-positive environment. Then I went back “in” and dated/lived with/fucked men until I was 27, when I met my first long-term female lover and came out again for good.

I’ve always been fat and that’s had a lot to do with shaping my personality and my understanding of what it’s like to be stigmatized for difference that can’t be hidden, and I’ve written quite a lot about this. I’ve experienced a lot more oppression from sizeism than from lesbian-hating even though I think I’ve been pretty obvious as a lesbian for the last 12 years. But as a fat person I’m constantly subjected to other people’s snap judgments and stereotypes about fat, which has given me a strong character but also a generalized mistrust of people and a somewhat shy, introverted personality. I think both of those things–people’s judgments about me, and the personality that has resulted from them–have negatively affected my work opportunities and social relationships.

pisaquari: How did male supremacy first touch you?

Amy: My family was a pretty traditional patriarchal family–pretty strict division of gender roles between my parents. My father worked in the shipyard. My mother worked as a nursery school teacher and also had total responsibility for housework, cooking, and childrearing; my dad did outdoor things like working on the cars and getting in the firewood. (Isn’t it great how “men’s work” is conveniently intermittent, unlike cooking, cleaning, and childcare which have to be done every day?) We lived eight miles from town, half a mile from the nearest neighbor away over the hill. My parents were also intent on hiding how bad things were at home, so we didn’t have much company or many social ties, and my childhood was relatively isolated.

My dad was a batterer; according to my mother, he “punished” her by hitting her with a belt at least once before I was born. They had come to some kind of détente about that by the time I came along, although psychologically and emotionally they were constantly at odds. I never saw him hit her, but he was verbally abusive to her, and humiliated her in front of family members or their few friends with lewd comments and put-downs. My mother was the typical “nagging shrew,” critical, negative and miserable, obeying the female socialization which says our happiness comes through others and so we have to harangue them into providing it. It was really a toxic environment to grow up in.

My mother was seeking upward mobility, class-wise, and as a teacher she thought she was the expert on raising children. She wanted kids that would reflect well on her in the community, where she was the head of a preschool that catered to middle- and upper middle-class families. She and my dad disagreed a lot about how to raise kids. He was from the “spare the rod and spoil the child” school, and I think hurting those he had control over — us, basically — made him feel like a real man. My mother relied on emotional manipulation and withholding in her attempts to carve us into obedient little plastic people — though she did spank us with a wooden paddle and slapped me across the face when I said things she didn’t like. My mother looked down on my father for not wanting to “better” himself. She was pretty critical and judgmental of him, and of me for the ways that I was like him and his family–fat, loud, “selfish,” “coarse,” “low-class.” (My younger brother’s outgoing personality was more like my mother and her father, whom she idolized, and she loved having a thin, athletic male child with light hair and eyes.) My dad was verbally and physically abusive to me, in a scary and out of control way, for trumped-up reasons, every chance he got. He could only hit me when my mother was out of the house–which wasn’t often, because she didn’t trust him. But the times when it happened are crystal clear in my memory, and it only took a few incidents, plus more frequent verbal abuse including extended screaming right into my face, to drive home the lesson that his anger was to be avoided at all costs.

My brother claims my father never hit him.

Between my father’s harshness and violence, and the ways my mother judged me “lacking” — in particular, having a fat, socially inept daughter didn’t do much for her credibility as the local early childhood expert — there was really no solace for me at home nor, of course, in the wider world, which just loves to persecute fat girls. So pretty much my earliest experiences embody some of the realities of life under male supremacy.

pisaquari: Were there any feminists closely involved in your upbringing?

Amy: My mother was what I like to call a “lip service” feminist. It was the 1970s when I was growing up, and she was very into the whole “girls can do anything boys can do” thing. Because I often believe what people SAY instead of what they DO, it took me years to realize that this espoused ideology did not begin to crack her loyalty to patriarchy, like favoring my brother over me and slotting me into “traditional” female roles. For example, she insisted that I take typing in high school so that I would have “something to fall back on.” This was not expected of my brother. In retrospect, the fact that I’ve made my living since I left college by typing is quite ironic, a self-fulfilling prophecy, if you will. I do wonder how my life would have been different if “something to fall back on” had been computer programming or another skill that isn’t part of the pink-collar ghetto. If my mother had had nonsexist expectations of me, would I have lived up to those instead? Or, given the larger reality of employment discrimination against me as fat/lesbian/woman, does it just not make that much difference?

pisaquari: Was there an “aha” moment for you for feminism? For radical feminism?

Amy: Many, many. So many that I can’t even think of one specifically, but I know a lot of them happened while reading Julia Penelope’s book Call Me Lesbian: Lesbian Lives, Lesbian Theory. That book described so many of the circumstances of my life and laid them out in a radical lesbian feminist framework.

pisaquari: What attributes in your personality/upbringing do you think made you more open to radical feminism?

Amy: Well, see the sections above about my family. I basically grew up as someone who was on the outside in almost every way, who was constantly ridiculed, abused, and put down, because of being female, because of being fat and therefore by definition unfeminine and unattractive. I was teased and humiliated relentlessly on a daily basis in school and that continues intermittently today — although more often these days I am simply dismissed as not having anything of value to contribute, as being stupid or incompetent because I’m apparently unable to make my body socially acceptable. Although I am white and have benefitted quite a lot from white privilege–particularly in terms of the education I was able to get– I grew up in an almost exclusively white area, so the focus during my childhood was more on how I was different from all the other kids, therefore “wrong.” I didn’t experience my whiteness as a way of being “right” although that has come into play later in my life.

For some people, and I’m one of them, I guess, if you get dumped on enough, it really trashes your loyalty to the system. My major tie-in to the system was being the smart kid. I did get attention and praise for that; good grades and teacher-pleasing behavior got me into a “good” college. It’s been a long-term struggle to give up wanting to be “right” and always know the answer. I felt like being smart was all I had as a little fat girl who didn’t conform to femininity particularly well, who wasn’t attractive or charming or athletic. My attachment to book knowing is apparent on the website, although hopefully I’ve been able to transform loyalty to patriarchal knowledge into loyalty to feminist knowledge. I think women’s writing is vital for connecting feminists across distance and keeping some remnant of our framework alive until we can come to mass feminist movement again. But, to get back to the question, in general there hasn’t been much for me to give up in becoming disloyal to the system. I’m still working on some of the ways that white supremacy has its claws into me, but I don’t have all that much to lose — and a heck of a lot to gain — by advocating revolution.

pisaquari: Do you call yourself a radical feminist to others?

Amy: I don’t generally use that term in real life when talking to people, no. I think people have too many negative, and wrong, ideas about what it means, and I hate to get into arguments. Though if someone is calm and genuinely curious I will talk with them about it. When it seems relatively appropriate, I will give my opinions on issue-specific stuff.

pisaquari: How do you integrate radical feminism into your personal relationships? Buying habits? Love? Family?

Amy: I’m super-fortunate to have had two radical feminist lesbian lovers. Cress and I kind of discovered radical feminism together, and I met Kya in a radical feminist context. It makes things so much easier, I wouldn’t consider an intimate relationship–lover or friend–with a woman who wasn’t really dedicated to her radical feminist politics. (Which is not to say that women with radical feminist politics automatically make great friends and lovers. Sadly.) My lovers and I have had wonderful adventures in learning together about transforming negative patriarchal attitudes about sexuality. I mean, just the transformation from straight woman to lesbian involves confronting woman-hating where it lives–the mythology about our vulvas being dirty and smelly and lesbians being sick and twisted perverts or emotionally stunted, all that internalized woman-hating gets transformed into this profound kind of appreciation for women on all levels, sexual, emotional, intellectual, even spiritual if you like that sort of thing. And then, ditching porn, “erotica,” together. Learning new ways to talk to each other, in bed and out. Wanting solutions to problems rather than wanting to be RIGHT. Progressively giving up our attachment to dominance and control and giving each other space to be, even when we disagree or behave badly. Trying to stay separate as individuals instead of merging into heterocoupledom. Being more accepting of our differences. Healing some from some of the damage that’s been done to us. When everyone involved wants radical transformation and creativity in love and sexuality, it’s heady, it’s pretty powerful. It’s exciting and real, and I think that part gets missed in so many discussions of “sex positivity.” There’s an incredible energy and freedom in being with another person (or more) when both of you are saying, we’re going to try to find another way to relate to each other, as free humans instead of as cardboard cutouts from some sexually explicit graphic novel. I feel really lucky to have had that kind of love in my life.

Kya is part of a broad network here of counterculture Boomer dykes and I’ve been pretty much adopted into that despite being 20 years younger than most of them. My exposure, through her, to the landdyke culture and communities has helped to develop my awareness of other ways of living. I’ve written some about that too. I have to stop and realize every now and then that, wow, most people don’t live like me. And I don’t mean surface stuff, because in many ways my life looks the same as most middle-class white amerikans. It’s more about the mindset–being part of a community where the mainstream ways of doing things are questioned and often rejected, where resources are shared, where people do things for each other without a lot of negotiation. The relationships have been going on for long enough that everyone knows what they give out will come back to them eventually, that someone will be there for them when they need it. I think that kind of open-handedness, generosity and trust is pretty foreign, at least in the mainstream culture as I know it.

I’ve gradually been separating from my family of origin, to the point where I’m only in touch with them infrequently now. That’s actually been harder than you might think, because despite the level of nastiness my parents created between them, I really always wanted strong relationships with my family. But I wanted honest and growing ones, and that desire wasn’t shared. They don’t want to honor me as a strong vibrant proud fat lesbian. They can’t see who I am. I’m not willing to have duty relationships, to play a fake role as the poor spinster aunt who can’t get a man so everyone has to feel sorry for her and invite her to easter dinner but wishes they didn’t. They can’t realize that almost everything that’s important to them–their loyalty to the status quo–is foreign, irrelevant, or insulting to me. So we just don’t talk.

As far as buying habits, I don’t know how different I am than most white middle-class amerikans. We try to shop at thrift stores, we recycle, we don’t use chemicals on the lawn, all that good middle-class liberal stuff. Lots of people do much better at antimaterialism than I do, many of them out of necessity. The best I can do there, and what I try to encourage others to do, is just to be honest about it. It’s not as good as making real change, but it’s better than trying to justify everything — “Well, I’M a feminist so therefore everything I DO must be feminist!” All that energy going into justification and denial blocks change. At least being honest opens the door to the possibility of doing things differently at some future point.

pisaquari: What has been the hardest part of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

Amy: Well, let me shift the focus of that a little bit and say that the most difficulty I’ve had in living out my radical feminist vision has been working with other women! I hate to say that, but I’m also observing that what feminists do is we either focus on the problems we have with each other, in a negative, obsessive, “I’m right and you’re wrong!” kind of way, or we gloss over them and pretend they don’t exist. We hardly ever analyze them and try to solve them. Call me sick and twisted, but I’ve been fascinated by intrafeminist conflict almost since I started being aware of how much feminists fight with each other. I’ve paid some attention and I do think there are things we can do, and I think we have to do them. Not “have to” in the sense of “because we’ll be good people then,” but in the most practical way. We have to because if we don’t, if we can’t figure out how to deal with ourselves and each other honestly, we WILL fail as a movement. We can’t build a movement without each other–whoever we define as “on our side.” Some women really aren’t on our side, so I’m not going for some rah-rah gooby anti-analytical unity kind of thing here. We don’t all have to like each other or want to be in each other’s presence. And we all have our bottom lines about who’s in our movement and who’s not. But when women agree with us on almost everything but we focus on a minor place where we don’t agree–the only thing that results is fragmentation, splintering, and general unpleasantness. We have to learn to be more honest about our privileges and our loyalties, because those are the places I see us getting stuck–not wanting to admit that we’ve benefited from some attribute that the system rewards, and that we are therefore loyal to the system at least that far. Or sometimes we just simply make mistakes, we behave badly, and mostly we’re unwilling to fess up to that. I include myself in all of this, of course. I spend a lot of time looking back and thinking about what I might have done differently in some difficult situations, in order to build solidarity rather than fracturing. I won’t say more about that now, but I do wish for and dream about — and am willing to work towards — a living radical feminist movement with women who share my principles and are willing to be honest and work together in good faith even through disagreement or personality conflicts.

pisaquari: How do you survive/find happiness living in a patriarchy? What are some things you like to do?

Amy: I’m kind of a practical, hands-on, earthy kind of person, in case you hadn’t noticed, so I like crafty things, particularly knitting. It’s very calming, I enjoy the colors and the textures of yarn and the act of making something for someone I love. I like to bake for parties and potlucks; I like to feed women. I like to work on little projects around the house; we just hung a gate over the laundry room door so the dog can’t eat the cats’ food. I’m pretty home-oriented; I like having a warm, welcoming place to invite women into and to snuggle into, myself. I like to just sit on the couch and look at the Georgia O’Keeffe posters and pet the cats. I like to ride my bike in circles around Kya and the dog while they walk to the park.

I like cheesy movies, mystery novels with female detectives, and young adult fiction/fantasy stories with girl heroes (Tamora Pierce rocks!). I like listening to woman-identified/lesbian music, the kind some people think is awful–folk music about political struggle like Emma’s Revolution, lesbian rockers like the Indigo Girl. The content and the solidarity is a lot more important to me than some white male standard of artistic competence.

As I said before, I’m really fortunate to be connected to a lot of lesbians here who, while they’re mostly not radical feminists, are definitely counterculture, leftover hippie, lefty, progressive, what have you. It’s never a perfect fit politically but it’s a warm lesbian cultural network of practical help and socializing. I had that in college and lost it afterwards, until just the last few years, and I’m really appreciating it, even though I’m sometimes infuriated by it also. It approximates in some way the radical feminist communal future I envision and helps me keep that picture alive in my imagination.

pisaquari: What sort of activist activities are you involved with?

Amy: I’m kind of a yo-yo activist — I take things on, and then I get frustrated with bureaucracy or what have you, and I give up for a while, and then I try something else. This past year, for example, I tried working with the local animal shelter, and I just couldn’t hack it, because so many of the structures and events were about convenience for humans rather than what the animals really needed. I was involved with ACORN during the primaries but haven’t found as much opportunity to be active there lately. Recently I’ve started escorting at the local abortion clinic, and I’m doing that with some other feminists rather than on my own, so I’m hoping it will stick. One thing that I have been consistently able to do is free or cheap web design for feminist and animal causes, and I plan to keep doing that.

pisaquari: Okay, so there is a radical feminist island–you are there right now:what are you doing?

Amy: Well, we’re doing whatever needs to be done! Working for cash money, gardening, building things, cooking, cleaning, endless meetings, processing, oh god the processing. Trying to get radical feminism off the island and into the mainstream, so everyone can be free from white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.

allecto: allecto

pisaquari: Site(s) you blog? If any?

allecto: I blog at Gorgon Poisons: http://allecto.wordpress.com; and Spinning Spinsters: http://spinningspinsters.wordpress.com

pisaquari: Places you most frequent/comment (can be nonfeminist)

allecto: Women’s Space: http://www.womensspace.org/phpBB2/

Buried Alive (of course): http://buriedalive.wordpress.com/

see my blogroll: I read them all.

Women’s Lives Matter and Women’s Life Matters: http://radfemspeak.net/forum/

pisaquari: How would you describe your background? Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

allecto: I guess it is complicated. My mother is half Black, from a dirt poor background. My ‘father was rich and white, he forced my mother late one night’… sorry, channeling Nina Simone there. My mother married my father when she was pregnant with me. My maternal grandmother is a native Papuan. Her father was half Portugese, half Papuan and her mother was half Chinese, half Papuan.

My grandmother was taken (not forcefully) by white nuns when she was five years old to be ‘educated’. (This was during the second world war. Papua New Guinea was colonised by white Australia. When the war was over the Papuans were ‘granted’ independence.) While she was being ‘educated’ she was not allowed to speak her language, nor was she allowed to have anything to do with her culture or family. She was finally returned to her family when she was 15. Unable to speak with her family she felt distanced from them and related better to white people. She became a nurse during the war, while her father was a translator.

Papua is very male supremacist. Domestic violence is common. My grandmother did not want to end up being beaten by her husband. She saw her mother and sisters and friends getting into relationships where they were beaten. So she decided to marry a white man and move to Australia. She was 20.

I am privileged in many ways. I am light skinned. I talk like a white person. I have been to uni. But there is a legacy of my grandmother’s history.

My mother’s sense of self was very negatively affected by being a half-Black and female. My mother doesn’t talk much about her past, but she does occasionally mention how difficult it was, knowing intimately that she was worthless and counted for nothing. My grandmother had 5 boys and 2 girls. She, having been indoctrinated with male supremacist values, valued the boys more than the girls. My mother is still trying to find worth within herself. She thought that marrying my father, who was rich and white, would bestow value onto her. Or rather, because a rich, white man wanted her, she thought this meant that she was worth something.

But my father abused her. Treated her like dirt. My father became obsessed with Christianity. My mother had to conform to his idea of a good little wife and mother. He tried to turn her into a slave. She tried to conform to his expectations of her, while he continued to abuse her emotional, verbally, socially and sexually. She had seven children to him. I am the eldest.

My father liked my mother’s exotic looks, but he didn’t like that she had a Black mother. We did not visit our grandmother nearly as much as we wanted to because she was Black. I always had thought it was because she lived an hour away from us.

When I was 10 we moved to Finland (my father is Finnish). It was awful there. Our relatives treated us horribly because we weren’t white. My father was coming into some inheritance but his siblings stole it from him. There were two factors at play here: their greed and their racism. It wouldn’t have been cool for them to do this if we were white.

My mother suffered horribly in Finland.

So while I am pretty well accepted as white in Australia, I do have some experience of what racism feels like. There is also the generational effects of white Australian imperialism, that has had a big affect on my mother, my grandmother, and the maternal side of my family.

Other privileges include being able-bodied, having employment, youth, health, love. Being skinny and not ‘unattractive’.

Other oppressions include lesbianism. Although I consider lesbianism to be a privilege in many respects.

pisaquari: How did male supremacy first touch you?

allecto: At the moment of conception. Possibly before that even. I believe that most heterosexual intercourse happens between unequal parties. Especially in the case of my mother. I know for sure that my father forced intercourse on her. I believe that my siblings and myself are the products of rape.

I was supposed to be a boy. They had the name picked and everything. Daniel. The first born son. Oops. Sorry daddy. You got a hairy-legged, lesbian, hell-spawn instead.

pisaquari: Were there any feminists closely involved in your upbringing?

allecto: Nope. Not one. I would call my mother a feminist now. But she wasn’t when I was growing up.

pisaquari: Was there an “aha” moment for you for feminism?  For radical feminism?

allecto: Not really. I’ve always been a radical feminist. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t see that there was serious dominance/submission issues in male/female relations. I started hating men when I started hating my father. I was 11 when I stopped calling my father ‘dad’ and started referring to him by name. Soon after that I stopped speaking to him all together, even though we continued to live with him for another 5 years.

I was considered ‘beautiful’ when I was younger. Men would constantly stare at me and hit on me. I hated it. I got my sister to spread rumours around school, that I was a lesbian. Um… so then all the girls hit on me too!!! It didn’t work so well. But it caused me to be really suspicious of men. I thought they all just wanted to fuck me so I just ignored all of them. It wasn’t till I got to uni that I met men that I could tolerate.

The ‘aha’ moment was finding out that there were other women in the world just like me. I can’t tell you how much that meant to me. My whole life I have been treated like a freak and my opinions have been mocked and ridiculed and belittled. My goodness, when I found out that I was actually one of thousands of women… it was so amazing. Women’s Space was part of that discovery and The Women’s Library in Newtown.

pisaquari: What attributes in your personality/upbringing do you think made you more open to radical feminism?

allecto: I have always been an outcast. Radical feminism is about becoming Radically Other. It seems fitting that the outcasts would be at home together.

Also I read and I think. Growing up we didn’t have a television because of religious reasons. I think that not being exposed to media conditioning helped me to become more analytical and critical than many of my peers. I loved books written by women with strong female characters. So that showed me a way of opting out. I knew that there was no way I was ever going to get married and have kids. I had seen what that did to my mother. Radical feminism was the only political, social, emotional and spiritual analysis that made any kind of sense of the reality I lived in.

pisaquari: Do you call yourself a radical feminist to others?

allecto: Yes. Unless I am at work. But even there I try to ease open the closet.

pisaquari: How do you integrate radical feminism into your personal relationships? Buying habits? Love? Family?

allecto: Uh. This is a hard question to answer. I don’t think that there is any decision or relationship in my life that hasn’t been affected/influenced by radical feminism. One of my sisters is a radical feminist. My mother is too, in her own way, so those relationships are great. My brother thinks like a radical feminist but acts like a man. That pisses the hell out of me I can tell you. And I can’t stop loving my brother, I can’t. But fuck I hate that he has grown into a man. I hate it.

I met Dissenter when we were 16 and while we actually didn’t like each other much when we first met, we are very similar in many ways, and we have become life-long friends. Dissenter and I were calling ourselves queer feminists when I discovered radical feminism. It didn’t take but 2 seconds for me to drop queer like a hot coal. I had already started being pissed off with queer by that stage. But I had never heard of radical feminism. Anyway, I bashed Dissenter over the head with radical feminist texts until she became one too. It hasn’t really changed our relationship because we were pretty much already rad fems by that stage.

I buy clothes from op shops, food from a co-op. I buy fair-trade whenever possible. I have been a vegetarian since I was 15. I don’t have a mobile phone or a microwave or a car. I try to cut down on electricity consumption and technological consumption as much as possible. I give money away, or lose it or spend it irrationally. I don’t do any of these things to ‘go without’ or ‘live in poverty’ but because things are not necessary for my happiness. In fact I think a lot of the time these things detract from happiness.

pisaquari: What has been the hardest part of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

allecto: Um. I guess the hatred and the callousness that we are treated with can be more than a little trying. I’ve started learning to enjoy getting shit flung at me again. I’m a little perverse that way.

It can be lonely. I really, really wish there were more lesbian feminists/radical feminists in my age group that I could hang out with.

pisaquari: How do you survive/find happiness living in a patriarchy?  What are some things you like to do?

allecto: I sing, write poetry, read, play the piano, garden, dance, bushwalk, take photos of myself in pretty dresses. I spend lots of time on the internet communing with my sisters. I really, really love my life.

Also I avoid men as much as possible. I work with women, I socialise with women, I live with a woman, I converse with women, I am political with women. Having lots of women in my life is bliss.

pisaquari: What sort of activist activities are you involved with?

allecto: None at the moment. I used to be but I’m taking a break.

pisaquari: Okay, so there is a radical feminist island–you are there right now: what are you doing?

allecto: Are all my radical feminist friends there too? If so, I am running around trying desperately to hug them all at the same time and gushing about how amazing it is to finally meet them.

Bonobobabe: Bonobobabe

pisaquari Places you most frequent/comment (can be nonfeminist)

bonobobabe:  they are the usual suspects.

I’m just as apt to read knitting/spinning blogs as I am feminist blogs.

pisaquari: How would you describe your background?  Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

bonobobabe:  Well, I’m white and female, so I get a point in each column, LOL.  I grew up thinking I was middle class, but I know now that it’s a specific tactic of the government to make people think they are middle class when they aren’t.  I think I was more likely working class.  My dad worked in a mill, and my mother worked part-time as a grocery store checker.  She was never a stay-at-home mom.  I did go to college, but it wasn’t common in my family.  In my parent’s generation, only my dad’s brother went to college.  In my generation, I have lots of cousins on my mom’s side of the family who didn’t go to college.  My own sister did not go, so it’s not as if I went to college because I was privileged.  I am still paying back student loans, so anyone who wants to call me privileged in that respect can take over my loan payments, thank you very much.  Also, my paternal grandfather was a Free Methodist minister, and even though my immediate family wasn’t very religious, thanks to the buffering effect of my mom’s side of the family, I did get enough indoctrination that I can look back and clearly see was abusive in some respects.  Telling children about hell is so wrong.  What kind of thing is that to do to a child?

pisaquari What was the family dynamic like? Traditional? Nuclear patriarchy all the way? Subversion of any kind?

bonobobabe:  We were pretty traditional.

Although, now that I look back on it, my mom did something that I’ve noticed a lot of women don’t do. She would not plan her day around my dad.

If she wanted to go to the store, she went.  If we were going to another town for a shopping spree, we went…whether my dad was up, yet or whatever.

I have a friend at work who told me that her live-in boyfriend sleeps late, and she’s an early riser, so she waits around for him to get up, and then he ends up setting the agenda for the day.

pisaquari So would you say your mother was the closest you had to a “feminist” growing up?

bonobobabe:  Well, during my formative years, yes.  And I wouldn’t call her a feminist, really. But after I was already grown and in college, I got to know one of my aunts (my dad’s brother’s wife) a little better.  They lived far away and I didn’t see them much.  I found out she was a feminist.  But my dad’s family is religious, so it was kinda weird.

pisaquari How did you find out?

bonobobabe:  We were talking about my other aunt (dad’s sister) who was having marital problems, and I quite brazenly said something about her deferring to her husband and that I didn’t agree with it, no matter what the Bible said.

I thought she would defend my aunt’s actions, but she agreed with me, citing some scriptural references that could be taken to mean that men and women are equal.

pisaquari ooooh my. How did the rest of the family react?

bonobobabe:  We were alone in a car going somewhere.  After that conversation, she actually invited me out to their house (which was a day long drive).  I stayed for a few days.  It was fun.

pisaquari did you talk feminisms?

bonobobabe:  A little bit.  I’m a jane-of-all-trades, so we talked other things as well.  My uncle has a Ph.D. in psychology, and my aunt has a

master’s degree in something that I can’t remember.  English, maybe.  They both have written books about the Amish (they lived in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania).

pisaquari Interesting.

pisaquari So going back a bit–How and when did first really discover you were living in male supremacy?

bonobobabe:  I don’t know.  I think I just observed things going on around me.  I was always asking my mom why dad was served dinner first, why didn’t he have to help clean house, etc.  I’m an observer, a people-watcher.  I think I remember asking my dad at one point, “Aren’t most people who commit crimes men?  Then why are they in charge?”  I think I realized that men were running everything, but I don’t think it touched me in an obvious way.  It was more like I realized it.  I can remember several small incidents of my mother (or other female relatives) telling me that I had to behave a certain way because I was female.  I usually just argued with them.

pisaquari So it sort of just snuck up on/in you?

bonobobabe:  Yeah.  I think so.  I’m very observant and interpersonal dynamics fascinate me.  I put two and two together because I would see women and men relating in ways that were different than women to women and men to men.  And it all seemed kinda fucked up.

pisaquari:  So would you say your fascination with interpersonal dynamics was more or less at the core of your coming to feminism/radical feminism?

bonobobabe:  You know, I never thought of it that way, but it’s possible.  There were other things, though.

pisaquari: like…

bonobobabe:  Well, if we’re analyzing personality, I’d say first off, my intelligence.  I think there is rampant stupidity in the general populace.  Gullibility is sometimes equated with simple ignorance, but I think intelligence plays a factor, too.  I think feminists are just less gullible that non-feminists.  We don’t believe everything that people tell us about the way the world is.

Plus, I am stubborn, strong-willed, and as my mother and father can attest to, if you tell me to drop it, I’m going to continue talking about it. LOL.  I have a friend who is the only female in her immediate family, and her mother died when she was a freshman in high school.  I asked her what it was like going through adolescence without a mother.  She said she often tried to talk about things with her dad, but he’d make it clear that he was uncomfortable, so she’d drop it.  I told her, “Yeah, I got those messages, too, but it just spurred me on harder!”

Also, I tested as a Myers-Briggs INTP, and as I understand it, because I’m introverted, the N (for intuitive) is turned outwards, and the T (for thinking) is turned inwards.  So, I’m apparently very intuitive about other people.  And it’s true.  I should’ve been in HR, because I can take one look at someone, talk to them for five minutes and know whether or not they should be hired for the job (and looking around at all the incompetent boobs I work with, apparently it’s not a skill that everyone has).  I can peg people pretty fast.  I’ve been accused of simply stereotyping them, but that’s not the case.  I can peg people who run counter to the stereotype.  And I can tell when someone is bullshitting me or if they have an agenda.  Even as a young girl, I could do that.  That probably is related to the interpersonal dynamics somewhat.

bonobobabe:  But all that just led to feminism, I think.  The radical stuff came later.

pisaquari: awesome explanation! So you didn’t come to radical feminism first?

bonobobabe:  No.  Regular ol’ feminism.  I did try to read Dworkin and Daly in college, but I couldn’t get it.  I did read somewhere that Daly would make up her own words, so I sort of decided that was why I couldn’t understand it.  But I think part of it is that although I am quite smart, I do better with concrete things.  I’m a tactile person, and I love examples.  I hate when someone goes on and on about abstract principles but doesn’t give any examples of how that plays out in the real world.

pisaquari What do you mean by “regular ole feminism”?

bonobobabe:  Well, I guess I mean liberal feminism, or feminism lite, or whatever it’s being called.  I believed that men and women were entitled to equal treatment under the law, equal pay for equal work, etc., but I didn’t yet understand that the problem went deeper.

bonobobabe:  But I found something that served as the stepping stone to radical feminism, although I don’t know if it’s a stepping stone, because I think it’s the same as radical feminism in some respects, but it’s not marketed to women as much as it is to men, and so the female aspect gets left out a lot, but I think it is the same.

pisaquari what was the stepping stone?

bonobobabe:  Primitivism.  My introduction to it was in the works of Daniel Quinn:  ”Ishmael,” “The Story of B,” and “My Ishmael.”  It didn’t take much of a leap for me to accept primitivism, because I had always been questioning the way the world was ever since I was little.  ”Why do we live in a house, but all the other animals live outside?”  ”Why can’t we just eat food that’s growing in the ground, instead of buying it in the store?”  Of course, my parents’ responses weren’t nearly satisfying enough.  And also, I’m very sensitive (neurologically, not emotionally).  I feel the effects of living in a civilized world, and my brain is very primitive, and I find that I process things differently than others.  I’ve had to make changes to my lifestyle to accommodate that.

bonobobabe:  I also feel a strong tie with the natural world, animals in particular.  They are my kin just as much as my human family.  So, becoming a primitivist wasn’t such a big leap, because I had already felt since I was a little girl that there was something wrong with the way humans were living.  And once you realize everything is fucked, you’re basically a radical feminist.  I believe that what primitivists call “civilization,” and what radfems call “patriarchy” are the same thing.  Or at least facets of the same thing.  So, my inquisitiveness at the world, humans’ place in it, and women’s place in it probably led me down this path.

pisaquari:  Really interesting–esp. because men are constantly trying to justify their misogynist behavior with the “natural world”–often one considered *primitive*–but I’m getting from you the word has a more nuanced meaning?

bonobobabe:  Well, the problem with studying primitive people is that there are tribes in existence currently, but they are living alongside civilization.  They have been touched by civilization.  I’m more interested in how humans behaved and interacted before the advent of agriculture, when humans were foragers.  There’s ample evidence from what I’m able to gather that humans were basically egalitarian.  Something went wrong, and no one is sure why or how, but some humans got it in their heads to be hierarchical, dominionist, etc.  Quinn distinguishes the two groups with the terms “Leavers” and “Takers.”  Leavers left answers about the big picture to “the gods,” and Takers took matters into their own hands.  You can see that this did not work out.

bonobobabe:  And I’m currently reading a book by Jim Mason called “An Unnatural Order,” and he’s mentioning that hunting was developed to give men some

sense of importance, because women were already important and powerful due to the childbearing thing.

pisaquari wow–I need to catch up on this Quinn

So, in all actuality, “primitivism” points to a period of egalitarian living?

bonobobabe:  That’s my take on it.  But although primitivism should be obviously radically feminist, most men who are interested in it don’t give two shits about women.  They are into primitive living (going so far as to hunt their own meat), which just shows me they aren’t going back far enough, because humans were mainly foragers, and any meat they ate was scavenged from carcasses that were killed by true carnivores.  Humans as we know them (homo sapiens) have been around for about 150,000 years (give or take), but organized hunting is only about 20,000 years old.  And agriculture is only 10,000.  So there you go. But read Quinn.  He has a fascinating analysis of schooling in “My Ishmael.”

bonobobabe:  I do want to add that I’m no expert on primitivism, by any stretch.  But also, anthropologists aren’t experts, either.  They often just assume that any sharp tool they find was used for hunting, when it may have been something used by women for foraging or preparing food.

pisaquari really fascinating stuff tho!  How long ago was it that the culmination of interpersonal intelligence and studies in primitivism became your radical feminism?

bonobobabe:  Hmm.  Probably within the last few years, but I just started identifying as radical feminist recently when I became aware of a radfem presence on the internet.  Although, I use the term radical feminist as my own label.  When talking to others, I tell them that I’m a crazy, man-hating feminist.  LOL

pisaquari really–so you never use the actual term “radical feminist” with others?

bonobobabe:  I do, but I like the shock value of the other term.

pisaquari yeah. A beat-them-to-it kinda method

So in recent years how have you been integrating radical feminism into your personal relationships? Buying and eating habits?

bonobobabe:  Hmm, well I see only female doctors, hairdressers, massage therapists, etc.  I needed a referral to a specialist and I told my primary care doc that I wanted a woman.  If I know that a certain business is woman owned, then I’d be more inclined to shop there, but I don’t make a huge effort to find out.  With chain stores, there’s no point. My closest friends know that I’m a radical feminist.  They aren’t, though.  After I mentioned to a friend that her husband did not respect her, she said, “But you don’t like men.”  And I said, “Just because I don’t like men, doesn’t mean I’m not right about your husband.”

As for love, I have decided to not ever have a relationship with a man again.  They are just bad news, you know?  I guess there is always the possibility of relationships with women, but I’m getting to the point where I’m questioning romantic love, period.  I think it’s contrived.  There’s something inherently flawed about it, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.  I think it’s inherently shallow and selfish. I’d like women to develop deep friendships where they care about each other as people.

bonobobabe:  As for eating habits, I renewed my commitment to veganism recently (after a multi-year lapse).  I know it stirs up some conflict among feminists, but

eating meat represents dominionism and a commodification of other life forms.  And men commodify women.  There just isn’t any other answer for me than to eschew the consumption of animals and their reproductive secretions.

bonobobabe:  And now that I have evidence that early humans were foragers, it makes a lot of sense.  We lived in harmony with nature for a long time.  I don’t want to imply that primitive humans were noble savages, because they did some bad things, but their attitude towards their environment was not one of dominionism, conquering, raping and pillaging.

bonobobabe:  I think that the hierarchy that we have established: men first, then fetuses, then women, then children, then animals, then the earth is bullshit.  I hate being oppressed, but I’m not going to hold on to my place in the hierarchy and take it out on animals and the earth.  Where do civilized humans think we’re going to live if the earth is polluted, decimated, and destroyed?  I think those things are feminist issues.

pisaquari Yes–you seem to have ecofeminist leanings then as well…

bonobobabe:  Yeah, I’m a radical, anarcho-eco-feminist

Oops, I mean radical, anarcho-eco-primitivist feminist.

Hard to keep the labels straight. LOL

pisaquari: and separatist I imagine?

bonobobabe:  Oh yeah, I forgot that, too.

OK, here we go: radical separatist, anarcho-primitivist, eco-feminist.

pisaquari RSA-PEF!

bonobobabe:  I like it!

pisaquari What has been the hardest part of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

bonobobabe:  I’m not sure, because I don’t know every nuance about radical feminism.

pisaquari That what you do know?As in the changes you listed above?

bonobobabe:  Well, not having a man in my life is probably the easiest.  I never dated much in school, anyway.

bonobobabe:  As for the hardest thing to integrate, it is hard to be a separatist.  I mean, I have male coworkers, and when I go into businesses I

have to deal with men.  I have been tempted from time to time, as when calling a customer service number, to request a woman if a man answers the phone, but I don’t know if that’s overkill or just being petty.   Also, it’s hard to maintain integrity when talking to female friends and coworkers of whom I’m quite fond because I don’t want to alienate them, but I know I can only go so far with them, because they will always choose their boyfriends/husbands over women, and so I hold back a bit.

pisaquari: So you would say comfortably there is nothing you miss about men?

bonobobabe:  Well, as much as I go on and on in feminist forums about the bad aspects of intercourse, I do miss sex to a degree, especially when I’m ovulating (damn Mother Nature and her sneaky ways to get me knocked up, LOL).  I miss the physical closeness, and although I’ve elevated masturbation to an art form, it’s just a bit better when there’s someone else there.  But as for the actual relating to men outside of the bedroom, I always felt like something was wrong.  I found myself behaving the way I was “trained” to and hating it.

pisaquari Yes. So are you hoping to find that physical closeness with a female some day?

bonobobabe:  I believe I touched on this in an earlier response.  It is always a possibility, because I’m not revolted by the thought, which is good–LOL–but I’m not sure how I feel about romantic relationships.  I guess I could have a pragmatic physical relationship with a woman, but that’s not quite my style.

bonobobabe:  Also, every so often I sort of investigate the idea…and most lesbians are not radfems, and there is so much of that butch-femme thing, which I think is just silly.

pisaquari Yeah–I knew you had touched on it so I was wondering how/what you considered the missed physical closeness?  Since you no longer are interested in the romantic stuff…but say just a “pragmatic” physicality wouldn’t please you either–is there a happy medium?

bonobobabe:  I don’t know if there’s a happy medium.

pisaquari Yeah I was getting that

How do you survive/find happiness living in a patriarchy?  What are some things you like to do?

bonobobabe:  I survive by not aligning myself with a man, or having a man in my home or bed.  I know most women feel the need to have a man for survival, but I know it would make me miserable, despite any gains in the area of finances or whatnot.  Every time I do something I want to do, I think if I were married and/or had kids, my time would not be my own.  Someone would always have a claim to me.  And part of that has nothing to do with feminism and patriarchy.  It’s just my introvertedness, my need for downtime, etc.  But part of it IS due to feminism.  Men like to colonize.  They put women in situations where they are never alone with their thoughts, or heaven forbid, alone with another woman where they might plot to take over the world or something.
For enjoyment, I knit and I spin my own yarn.  I have several hand spindles and two spinning wheels.  I also play music.  I recently took up the ukulele and the ocarina.

pisaquari What sort of activist activities are you involved with?   if any?

bonobobabe:  None.  I’m not an activist, other than just being myself and maybe influencing people by example.  It’s funny you asked this, because I recently just came to terms with it.  I realized that everyone is wired differently.  I’ve felt pangs of guilt every so often that I don’t “do enough,” but I don’t have the personality to be an activist.

I realized this recently when I renewed my commitment to veganism.  I immersed myself in literature, videos, etc. and I found myself feeling very depressed, angry, and having uncomfortable physical symptoms.  I realized that I cannot continue to take in that information.  It hurts me terribly that animals are commodified and mistreated.  It makes me physically ill.  Several months ago, I learned about the feud between Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse.  Westinghouse was a proponent of AC current, and Edison was a proponent of DC current. In order to show that AC current was unsafe, Edison used to electrocute animals in public displays.  His piece de resistance, as it were, was the electrocution of a circus elephant named Topsy, who had killed her trainer.  There is footage of this on the internet.  You see Topsy standing there, then smoke rises up from underneath her feet and she topples over.  Well, I cried off and on for days over that, and it happened over a hundred years ago!

I also have problems reading feminist blogs, especially ones that constantly chronicle the

abuse of women.  Talk about feeling enraged and helpless at the same time!  Not a good combination for me.  I’m tired of feeling physically sick.  I’m too sensitive to injustice and I don’t have the personality or the constitution to be an activist.  But I do have a job, so I’ve started donating money to people who DO have the personality and ability to go out and fight the good fight.  We all have our part to play.

pisaquari: I think that counts.

pisaquari What’s one question you would like to ask all the other radical feminists you encounter online?

bonobobabe : I’d ask them if they’d like to collectively buy some land so we can have a radical feminist commune.

Of course, the government would probably lay siege on it.

pisaquari nice segue!…So there is a radical feminist island–you are there right now: what are you doing?

bonobobabe:  Probably negotiating with the other women to get out of any childcare duties!  And tending the vegetable garden.

Maggie: I am known as Maggie Hays on the Net.

pisaquari: Site(s) you blog? If any?

Maggie: I am the creator of the feminist anti-porn site AgainstPornography.org. I updated my blog last week. It is maggiehaysagainstporn.blogspot.com

Maggie: Places I most frequent/comment: Genderberg, RadFemSpeak.net, at

at the moment but I also comment on rad fem blogs when I can.

pisaquari: How would you describe your background? Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

Maggie: I was raised in a Catholic family, and I came to see patriarchal religion for what it really is: oppressive and misogynistic. I had a childhood in a working-class neighborhood. I feel I am unprivileged because I’m female in a sexist culture, though I still recognize that i have white privilege… Women of color are, unfortunately, twice as oppressed…

pisaquari: How long did it take you to understand the oppressiveness of religion?

Maggie: I did not understand it until I read Mary Daly and Andrea Dworkin, quoting parts of the Bible which are blatantly sexist… and they were also giving their insightful analysis of religion.

me: Would you describe your family as traditional and patriarchal?

Maggie: Well, They’re against abortion; they defend marriage (and are mad at me for not being married at 28); they are mad at me for not believing in their patriarchal god…from www.againstpornography.org/mystory.html: “I was raised in a poor, working-class, Catholic, and rather dysfunctional family, living in a suburban house. I was the only child in the house. My parents were going to the church every weekend, and were often screaming at each other during the rest of the week. My dad usually started the arguing — by shouting about money, bills, debts, etc… My mom continued the quarrel, in defense of herself. “

My dad used porn.

My dad had once been a john.

pisaquari: How did you find these facts out?

Maggie: He was frequently renting porn from the same video store my mom and me were going to rent mainstream films. My mom knew he used porn and that he was often renting it; she told me. He also had Playboy & other porn mags, and porn books, plus a porn stash in the basement.

One day, my mom told me he had once paid for sex from a prostitute.

pisaquari: How did she feel about that?

Maggie: She didn’t seem to like it. I often wondered why she was often mad at him, maybe for being a john, maybe ’cause of the porn, or maybe because he was unstable, many, many reasons, I believe. Mom often shouted at him.

pisaquari: I can imagine–were you really young when you first discovered his porn use?

Maggie: I was 12 years old

No, I mean I was 11. I was 12 the first time I saw porn

I think, as far as I can recall…

me: Do you remember what that was like?

Maggie: What, first seeing pornography?

pisaquari: yes

Maggie: Well, that day I was feeling bad. I discovered that there was a dimension of this world that i hadn’t known about. It seemed ‘mechanical’ and ‘inhuman’ to me; these are the 2 words i remember thinking. Plus, the video (that I had picked up from my dad’s collection and put into the VCR) was so racist. It was portraying an Asian woman as “naturally compliant”. Sick!

pisaquari: oh gosh. I bet that burned in the memory.

Maggie: Yeah, like a sort of an imprint in the brain, I’d say…

pisaquari: oppression is really impression isn’t it.

pisaquari: how do you think the discovery of this affected your sexuality? self esteem?

Maggie: Well, I think porn kinda made me feel really bad and at the same time I believe that it sorta prepared me (LOL, the magazines for teenage girls I was reading were porn) to be submissive and believe that I would enjoy it. But, When I finally had sex, my self-esteem dropped…

pisaquari: Do you think that was because you “had sex” the way it had been presented to you in the porn?

Maggie: I think I lost my virginity because of peer pressure. “All the girls were doing it so I had to” It was at a one-night-stand. This made me feel bad. But I had sex a second time when I met my first boyfriend (who was into porn) and the intercourse and a little more was imposed on me. I was 18. It was like I had gotten into that situation, I had shown myself willing and turned on by “super hetero-sex” but then when the moment cam eI wasn’t ready and it hurt awfully. It was imposed on me and i couldn’t go back, I couldn’t say no. But I was thinking No and crying; he still went on with it. And I still stayed two years with him, all the while he was using porn; he was a fan of pornography.

pisaquari: interesting use of the word “imposed” I’m noting…

Maggie: Well, I didn’t want to sound like a “tease”, I could not say No.

pisaquari: Yes I could see that at the time. I’m just mentioning that not having the ability to say “no” with penetration goes by another name not often enough

Maggie: Do you know what I meant about the kind of situation I described?

pisaquari: Yes, starts with an R…

Maggie: Yeah, but according to male-supremacist laws, it wouldn’t be, you know?

pisaquari: Yes. The problem is the males only count FORCE in terms of screaming and kicking–which is perfect because they don’t count psychological FORCE, the kind that hits you like a bomb between the ages of 0 and 13 (like your dad’s collection) then numbs you out of the ability to refuse years later.

Maggie: Okay. I was with him two years. I just stayed ’cause I was feeling lonely and thought I was being “loved” by somebody. “The problem is the males only think about FORCE and unless you are screaming and kicking you don’t count” True. And when you quietly cry, for some guys, it doesn’t count. Thanks for all your consideration. I agree with what you said about force (physical or, yes, psychological). My first boyfriend showed me pornography many times during the 2 years I was with him.

pisaquari: Were you a practicing Catholic during this time?

Maggie: No, I was always non-practicing. Though, i believed in “god”, I was always pro-abortion, ’cause I’d read about it, and I had a high school friend who had aborted. I believed it was her right and choice.

pisaquari:  Were you always rebellious to your immediate and powerful surroundings?

Maggie: To my parents, yes. I had loads of arguments with my family. To my boyfriends, I was rather weak and submissive. I guess I just wanted to be “loved”.

pisaquari: Do you think your dysfunctional childhood made you more willing to fight and challenge? (even if that dynamic, in a family, is a destructive one?)

Maggie: To fight and challenge what?

pisaquari: Patriarchy, men (eventually).

Or, what attributes in your personality/upbringing do you think made you more open to radical feminism/fighting patriarchy?

Maggie: Well, I had a lot of feminism in the back of my mind, like some weird thoughts, I couldn’t quite put my finger on them. It was “there’s something that isn’t right here or there in that relationship”, but I did not have words to describe those thoughts (in later years, when I read rad fem books I found those words). But it is also worth mentioning that, before discovering radical feminism, a series of events happened in my life, like when the lesbian part of myself came out (which was a positive thing); or the fact that after I had been raped, had been into sub-dom relationships, I couldn’t stop going to clubs at some points, wearing tight outfits and trying to look “fuckable” to men, and trying to feel ‘empowered’

pisaquari: How long were you trying to make relationships work with men before you starting feeling an interest in women?

or were you always interested in women?

Maggie: I have no sexual orientation as I believe that “sexual orientation” is a social construct. I think when I had been hurt by my second boyfriend (whom I loved -unlike the 1st one- and who broke my heart), I started kissing women. I felt I was disobeying social order when i first kissed a woman, which was great and subversive.

pisaquari: But I imagine you did it for more reasons than subversion…

Maggie: Yes, I realized I loved women too!!!

pisaquari: So were books sort of the biggest radical feminist revelation for you?

Maggie: I already had felt the patriarchal system’s pressure upon me, but I had no words to describe my thoughts. The books gave me words that had never been given to me by this culture. The books and theory, and also the stories of women gave me a goal.

pisaquari: So about when in your life did you discover these books? And how?

Maggie: I was surfing the Net and reading women’s sex life stories on chat boards. I notice that these women were complaining about kinds of sex they didn’t like being imposed on them. So then I wanted to find out what was happening. Why were their partners like that. And I typed something on Google which led me to a pro-feminist article against pornography. I then wanted to find out more so I ordered books, went to anti-porn conferences, etc.

pisaquari: Were you out of the 2nd awful relationship by then?

Maggie: Oh, yeah, it was in May 2006. I was 26.  My 2nd relationship ended in 2002,. Though, he still used me afterward a couple of times.

pisaquari: So you began to discover anti porn literature and how long till you were able to find radical feminist anti porn views?

Maggie: I first read Pornified, which wasn’t really radical feminist. But then later on I read Dworkin, MacKinnon, Gail Dines, Diana Russell, etc And I also found a whole range of radical feminist literature…

me: Do you remember how you found it? What was the link?

Maggie: There was a booklist on One Angry Girl’s website. That was a start.

pisaquari: So for two years you’ve been coming into a radical feminist understanding

Maggie: Yes.

pisaquari: And how have you begun to integrate radical feminism into your life?

Your personal relationships? buying habits? eating?

Maggie: Well, I’m currently being more and more women-centered and moving away from my partner (he’s not very communicative)… and I feel the relationship is breaking. Apart from that, I’ve been in touch and met many feminist women and organizations, and though I don’t see them all the time, I help out when i can, and they brought a lot to my life. Regarding eating, I’m not a vegetarian, but I’d love to be. Buying habits: I stopped buying (and wearing) make-up, high heels, tight clothing and felt a lot more free.

pisaquari: and how has your general emotional state changed since these changes?

including psychological

Maggie: Yeah, I feel like I am feeling both very sad and very angry that that I found out the truth about women’s conditions under patriarchy… and the fact that almost nobody out there sees it is what hurts me the most… I found out that I had been raped a few years back and I had never called it rape when it happened. When I was 23-24, I’d suffered domestic violence from a 4th relationship, and I hadn’t called it domestic violence… I had a coping mechanism which I call the “mind-split”. It happens when I mentally shut down and deny what’s happening or numb the pain.

pisaquari: Do you feel there are benefits as well, to having a better understanding of women’s condition?

Maggie: Everyday I speak to my classmates (I’m a student) or workmates (I’m a part-time worker) and i realize that the male ones probably use porn, it makes me sick, they’re hurting women by creating the demand and they’re gonna also probably or already have coerce(d) their partners into sex. It makes me sick just thinking about it, so I shut down when it’s too painful. “Do you feel there are benefits as well, to having a better understanding of women’s condition?” Yes, because I can explain to other women what i know (whenever I can).

pisaquari: How do people generally respond?

Maggie: When I get the opportunity to speak to women about what i know, I notice that some women are very interested and others just distance themselves from what i say, coz it is too painful this kind of reality for them…

pisaquari: Yes

What has been the hardest principle of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

Maggie: I guess it may have been giving up on heteronormativity. it wasn’t easy as I had been so socialized into “liking the boyz”, but every day I’m getting more and more happy just getting away from it…

pisaquari: How has blogging changed you?

Maggie: Maggie: It helped me speak out and get feedback on how I do, though i blog very intermittently, mostly due to lack of time and real life problems… I’m planning on posting again within 2 weeks… It also gave me power, the power of words. But, unfortunately, within this system, my words often get twisted around out of context…

pisaquari: What’s one question you would like to know about all the radical feminists you encounter online?

Maggie: ahem… I bet they’ve got so many stories similar to mine, I’d like to find out how similar? What do we have so much in common?

pisaquari: Yes

hopefully we will find out!

Last question!

Okay, so there is a radical feminist island–you are there right now: what are you doing?

Maggie: Re-building a society where there would be no rape, no prostitution , no gender roles, no sexual terrorism…

pisaquari: So that’s what the island looks like…and I assume right now you would be defending that with all your might?

Maggie: Yep

S.M. Berg: Just ‘sam’ on blogs for the most part, but I can also be found under the incarnations of Sam Berg, Samantha Berg, and S.M. Berg.

pisaquari: Site(s) you blog? Write? If any?

S.M. Berg:I hang my hat at http://www.genderberg.com when not a-courting at the sizable number of radical feminist blogs out there. My writings have been published at news, politics and entertainment websites of various sorts but my main gig is genderberg.

pisaquari: Places you most frequent/comment (can be nonfeminist)?

S.M.:Feminist-blogwise, I’m a perennial fan of Women’s Space and Reclusive Leftist, and lately Hoyden About Town has kept me coming back for more. I read The Guardian and Popmatters.com every day, and at least once a week I check out what’s going on with my favorite music artists. Some of those Lolcats make me bust a gut and I occasionally romp through their cheezburgers.

pisaquari: How would you describe your background? Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

S.M.:I grew up in a lower-middle class New York family in the archetypical post-war suburb, Levittown. Dad worked a blue collar union job in Manhattan and mom mostly didn’t work. Half my family is Catholic and half Jewish so my parents scrapped both for Lutheranism, but I had healthy doses of exposure to each religion from relatives. My parents’ guiding principle in childrearing was that children were home-grown slaves, and I wish that were a joke or exaggeration. Public officials who noticed the bruises and neglect tried to save me once when I was seven, but they failed.

After the court battle, my parents moved to a small town in the Catskill mountains where no one can hear you scream. My internship in Purgatory, NY ended with relocation to a huge state university and the beginning of my true life. Grades soared once I was in control of my own destiny, and I graduated with honors in English literature and as valedictorian of my linguistics class. Soon after getting my degrees I moved to Costa Rica to test my independence, then soon after coming back I moved into a lovely railroad apartment in Brooklyn with my life partner, the man who still makes my insides surge with undiluted affection over a decade later.

That’s twenty years in two paragraphs.

pisaquari: The abuse you describe sounds severe (and I am so sorry for it, child abuse has many immeasurable effects)–how did the officials come to know of the abuse?
How did the officials fail?

S.M.:It’s a boring story, really. They saw bruises on me at school, the school sued to have me removed, my parents won by lying about the abuse and then skipped town. Who can say now if it would have been better to place me in a foster home? It unfolded as the Fates decreed and made me who I am today.

pisaquari: As for your degrees, how many did you receive and what were they?

S.M.: I double-majored in English and linguistics as part of my plan to travel the world teaching English as a second language. I’ve worked for a language translation and interpretor company near the United Nations building and as a Berlitz teacher in Costa Rica and New York, but my favorite stint was doing accent reduction with a group of Harvard-educated biochemists. These Chinese folks were geniuses working on the cure to Hepatitis C but because they couldn’t pronounce words like “blood” as well as native English speakers they got racist crap from colleagues.

pisaquari: And what prompted the move to Costa Rica specifically? Also more interested in the independence you speak of–since you had already moved away from home, what were further tests to prove?

S.M.: I adore the rush of traveling and had done some backpacking in the UK, so when the constraints of classes fell off like shackles I needed to stretch my legs. Moving to Singapore was considered, but Costa Rica was more in my price range. In between graduation and the plane ride to Costa Rica, I happened to fall google-eyed in love. Leaving him so soon after finding him sucked, but I had decided to travel and teach ESL and that’s what I did. The glorious love letters I got were worth the moments of missing him, and I proved to myself that no matter what, I was my own woman who could make my own way anywhere in the world.

pisaquari: What made you want to move back?

S.M.: Visa regulations. Costa Rican police actually did a raid on the language school one week after I left and kicked some of my co-workers who overstayed their visas back to the USA.

pisaquari: And how did you meet this love?

S.M.: We both worked at a bookstore and were friends until one raucous night of fancy-dress dancing when we became more.

pisaquari: So where were you in your feminist journey at this point?

S.M.: Like so many young women, I felt the injustices done to my gender but didn’t articulate or organize the thoughts until I was about 20-years-old. Classes on postmodernism and queer theory opened my eyes to the fluidity of gender, but in the beginning I could only see the organized prejudices against gay people and my scant political activity circled around gay rights. While living in Brooklyn I got heavily involved with RESULTS, a grassroots citizen’s lobby seeking to alleviate the worst aspects of poverty, and I noticed that my success rate getting letters to the editors published was incredible. The 2000 Presidential Selection bumped my political involvement up a few notches as I became one of the many thousands of people Ralph Nader has inspired to civic duty.

Immediately upon moving to Portland in 2001 I threw myself into growing the Green Party and supporting the local Planned Parenthood, but the Pacific Green Party wasn’t very welcoming to women so I shifted more efforts to PP. I began writing pro-choice articles for a local progressive newspaper and co-started a PP splinter group of young activists called SHAG (Sexual Health Activist Group) that I wound up leading on mischievous reproductive rights adventures for two years.

pisaquari: And what of radical feminism? How did that conversion finally happen?

S.M.: Since I’ve written in the past of my political progression from liberal to radical (in these two essays 1 & 2 ), I’m going to use this opportunity to talk more personally about what motivates my radicalism.

1. All naked women are created equal
http://www.genderberg.com/phpNuke/modul … age&pid=17

2. Female Chauvinist Liz
http://www.genderberg.com/phpNuke/modul … age&pid=40

Somewhat unusual for a radical feminist, I dedicated my website to a man named Phillip Michael Peck. Phil was my best friend in junior high school, a gay boy from Long island serving out his term in Purgatory, NY after his parents divorced. He helped me survive to adulthood. I did not help him survive adulthood so well, because at thirty-two he died from complications with medicines taken for the HIV a john gave him. “Sam,” he told me, “I could’ve gotten this death sentence for twenty extra bucks for a bareback.”

We met over Whoopie Goldberg in the back of the science room. We hadn’t said a word to each other until he had a gaggle of girl adorers around him talking about celebrities, and one girl said Whoopie was ugly. Phil indignantly exhorted, “Whoopie Goldberg is beautiful!” and the gaggle scoffed for the half-moment it took me to lift my head and solidly confirm, “Whoopie Goldberg IS beautiful.” His eyes met mine for the first time and we fell in love.

At fourteen Phil was turning tricks with older men who solicited him in NYC mall bathrooms while visiting his dad. From there he went on to do pornography, live sex shows, and drag performances using my middle name, Marissa, as his stage name. He ran a gay escort agency until he got arrested in a hotel overlooking Madison Square Garden.

I used to brag to people with sex positive pride that I had sexy sex worker friends who were happy and living the good life, thereby boosting my own sexee self by choosing not to relay the stories Phil told of getting raped, stealing drugs and money from tricks, and getting various sexually transmitted diseases. He once told me about stealing a huge bag of cocaine from a trick with, “Honey, this city better be big enough for the two of us because I can’t see him again.”

Phil kept turning tricks after learning he was HIV positive. No worried lecture from me could change his need for money and his lack of any other way to get it so I didn’t bother. None of my conscience-buckling at the thought of him spreading AIDS could change his reckless behavior so I supported him with the unconditional love of lifelong friends. We were friends his whole short life long.

Of course I don’t blame myself for what he went through at the hands of male johns and male cops, but I can’t help wondering if things might have been different if I didn’t selfishly encourage his prostituting for the years before he finally exited. He had a former trick who kept hiring him to clean his massive Westchester house, but every time the man made a sexual advance towards Phil it got refused. “It’s not worth it anymore, not for all the money he has,” Phil told me over coffee the last time I was in New York.

I have loved two people destroyed by men who believe it is their right to economically coerce sexual submission whenever and however they please. Phil was the first and the worst, because I loved him through all fifteen years, from start to finish to the end.

pisaquari: was the death of Phil The spark for radical feminism?
S.M.: No, Phil died a year and a half ago, but don’t underestimate the radicalizing powers of being a girl from a lousy family with a gay boy best friend in rural New York. There was even one phoned-in death threat.

I was what radical feminism is before I knew what radical feminism was. Before I knew anti-war and anti-authoritarian were feminist or radical, I knew war was wrong and thinking you’re better than other people was wrong. My childhood was a good primer for eventually embracing myself as a radfem, but the path ambled before me and the decisions I made consistently steered me in that direction. Always pro-choice and pro-queer, while in college I changed my mind about the death penalty and affirmative action. I’ve never owned a car or had a driver’s license (doesn’t mean I’ve never driven), I will never marry or have kids, and I smoke marijuana legally every day.

One self-realized foot after the other and soon I had strayed farther from mainstream than expected. When you’re in your anti-porn star shirt seriously discussing plans to humanure while ripping up old political placards into the compost pile for your organic garden, American affluenza seems more like slow suicide than a normal lifestyle.

pisaquari: How do you integrate radical feminism into your personal relationships? Buying habits? Love? Family?

S.M. Berg:

“Buying habits?“

I’ve never been a big spender or brand name devotee, but struggling against the urge to consume needlessly was a challenge while living in capitalism ground zero, NYC. Though I have a few inexpensive baubles of yore, I no longer wear jewelry. However, I save pennies and plan for new tattoos, making the concept of adornment very much still in. Hallelujah for the prohibitively high cost of good tattooists and being financially forced to pace myself. I’ve read radical feminist arguments against such body modifications, notably in The Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism, and they score some damn fine points about behavioral conditioning. So do lesbian separatist feminists.

The Brooklyn Years were the happiest of my life, and I feel a loss of innocence when I think of how much my life changed the year before moving to greener pastures in Portland. The debacle of the 2000 presidential process, which I witnessed as a poll watcher for the Green Party, erased my optimistic enthusiasm like it was child’s chalk, and the World Trade Center disaster a few months later finished off any lingering remnants of youth’s ignorant bliss. I don’t mean I’m unhappy now because I’ve rejoiced in my freedom from fear since finding it, but there has been an undeniable, skeptical shift in how I view the world due to a widening radfem consciousness about injustices people perpetrate and perpetuate.

“Personal relationships, love and family?”

Last year I got sterilized via Essure on my birthday. It was supposed to happen several days sooner but bodies are unpredictable sometimes. I never wanted to bear and raise children, and radical feminism bolstered my conviction. Same with marriage; I didn’t desire to be a wife before I became a radical feminist and through explorations and questioning I found the language to express why my soul has always soured on the prospect.

There are facets of radical feminism closed to me because I’m partnered with a man, and like any road not taken it makes for wistful what ifs. My answer to the stock question of lottery-winning fantasies is to buy a chunk of land in Sweden where only women and girls can live, and I muse about the fence that would separate my partner from the women knowing it’s an imperfect solution but whatever, it’s my fantasy and I’ll make it as delectably impractical as I wish. The non-fantasy part is that my pillar of a partner would have no problem being excluded from a few acres out of respect for women, me, and radical feminism.

pisaquari: What has been the hardest part of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

S.M. Berg: Probably refraining from the spiral into a hopeless hole when daily examples of woman-hatred are shoved in my face despite my best efforts to avoid them.

I work seven miles from where I live and every weekday I bike to work and back. Most days it’s a pleasant ride, but whether it’s a porny strip club ad on a telephone pole, some sidewalk guy ordering me to smile for him, or a bar advertising a pimp & ho party with a photo of a woman’s lacquered fingers spreading open her asshole (all true examples), some days my 35-minute ride becomes an angry, pedal-pumping drive.

Portland has several areas where prostitution is a constant, and I live in the city’s worst neighborhood for prostitution while working in the city’s worst neighborhood for gang violence, often prostitution-related. I can go about my workday happy as a sam until hearing a woman outside my window ask her pimp if she can go pee. http://www.genderberg.com/phpNuke/modul … age&pid=55

One late afternoon I saw a girl of about 14-15 prostituting a few blocks from my house and I didn’t make it home before starting to cry. I was having a swell day until then. When I go into pornography stores and strip clubs to educate myself I’m braced for the outpouring of woman-hatred, but unexpectedly seeing that child on the corner discretely wave at cars driven by men sucker-punched me in the solar plexus.

pisaquari: How do you survive/find happiness living in a patriarchy? What are some things you like to do?

S.M. Berg: Predictable as it may be, doing activism gives me a purpose and makes me feel like I’m not just taking patriarchal shit lying down. I don’t promote the forums as a healing space because it’s mainly an information and action-oriented site, but feedback from survivors and other members has been that fighting against pornstitution, however small or with however many other people, heals them by providing a productive, focused outlet and camaraderie with others who get where this hits them.

Less radfemically, I spend a lot of time gardening my way to organic food and flowers, something that came as a surprise since I’m not a homebody generally and I detest cooking. Playing in the dirt is most of the fun, though I’ve gotten more into learning the nitty gritty of soil composition over the years. I devour gardening books from library shelves, sometimes rereading the better ones. Flipping through a catalog of plants seems like dry reading but oh the excitement when I see an herb I’ve never heard of before or a type of Bougainvillea that can grow in Zone 8.

The role of certain drugs in maintaining some semblance of sanity cannot be overstated. Nothing prescription, usually organic. It’s tricky to endorse drug use and I don’t mean to be irresponsible just honest, but it’s true that the first time I dropped acid something changed in my mind permanently and for the better.

Music is a great passion of mine, and I dance often. Any hipster cred received for XTC being my favorite band is purely incidental to the gloriousness that is Andy Patridge’s Tori-sort of kooky musical genius. I love to swim and have a gym membership pretty much just so I can play mermaid any time the mood strikes. My taste for engaging in thrill-seeking sports is limited by my wallet, but if I could afford to I would skydive, whitewater raft, and firewalk over several feet of hot coals again and again.

pisaquari: What sort of activist activities are you involved with?

S.M. Berg: Here’s a rundown of what I’ve been up to in autumn:

There’s the usual writing magic I work with publication pending in a few places, and of course the time and energy it takes to support genderberg members new and old. I’m mega proud that Dr. Melissa Farley saw fit to put a link to my prostitution FAQ at the Prostitution Research & Education website. http://www.prostitutionresearch.com/c-p … facts.html

Locally, I’ve worked on pulling together two forums addressing prostitution in Portland. My neighborhood has five times the prostitution of other Portland neighborhoods and my neighbors are furious, so we convened two well-attended public meetings to make politicians take action. The first community meeting in September went exceptionally well with lots of pro-Swedish model stuff about going after johns presented to the packed house of 300 people. (details here http://www.eastpdxnews.com/index.php?mo … id_art=992)

The second meeting in October focused on neighbors working out solutions. (details here http://eastpdxnews.com/index.php?mod=ar … d_art=1015) There’s no better teaser for the drama that went down at the second meeting than this one from East PDX News, “Learn what a prostitution-fighting expert told neighbors at the “Take Back 82nd Avenue” Town Hall meeting. And, find out why the evening’s second keynote speaker, a reformed prostitute, was visibly angry about a leaflet handed out at the meeting.”

I attended the September 24th meeting of the Oregon Human Trafficking Task Force and helped improve a survey for social service providers who come into contact with victims of trafficking.

In conjunction with the community uprising against pornstitution, I’ve been asked to speak on local radio twice in the past few weeks and have phoned in to other radio shows.

I’ll be speaking as part of a University of Portland forum on human trafficking in late October, and in mid November I’ll be speaking to three Women’s Studies classes in Vancouver, Washington. It’s amazing how much I’m asked to speak when you consider women’s word of mouth has led to every invitation I’ve gotten. Some friends lovingly badger me to send announcements of my speaking availability and I consider it, but I do still have a full time job, writing and volunteer commitments, and a charmed life to live. Plus, public performance elicits nausea and stresses my body even under the best circumstances, so I get the job done despite the emotional and physical toll it takes on me. This is grim, humanity-doubting shit to keep on the front burner in your head.

Then there’s the anarchist activism I can’t rightly speak of because The Man doesn’t recognize resistance to gender oppression as legitimate, but every sticker placed, every sign defaced, every sexist word replaced is a mini freedom-fighting action. Sam’s Greatest Hits are tunes sung in the key of F(eminism) sharp.

pisaquari: Awesome stuff!

pisaquari: Okay, last question.  There is a radical feminist island–you are there now: what are you doing?

S.M. Berg: I’m sparking a bowl of pakalolo with a magnifying glass, then heading off to plant fruit trees as the bowl makes its way around the circle of women sitting cross-legged in the sun.

Demonista: demonista. sometimes Winnie small. on my lj blog, peaceculture.org, bermudaradical.blogspot.com – the last one, i’m new to, so i’ve only done a couple posts

pisaquari: Blogs/Sites you most frequent (reading &/or comment)

Demonista: allecto’s, my lj friends and some comms, recently, heart’s, : http://belenen.livejournal.com/, http://captainvanille.livejournal.com/, http://cruelbitch.livejournal.com/, Demonista: http://dis-senter.livejournal.com/ Demonista: http://dragort.livejournal.com/ and more

pisaquari:How would you describe your background? Naming as many points for which you are privileged and oppressed as possible.

Demonista: ok. sexed female, want to be genderfree. raced white, Scottish ancestry mainly. welfare poor family (grew up on state assistance as our sole source of income), 2 parents but dad physically disabled. my mom is depressed, but not severely. i’m close to 21 (will be in five days), in university, with the help of OSAP (student loans). i’ve been vegetarian since 11, became a vegan several months ago. feminist since 12, radical feminist since 14. able-bodied, higher than average intelligence. i’ve been repeatedly sexually harrassed, and sexually assaulted when i was 4-5…

and again in my first year of uni in a case of “assumed consent”, and again in a sense

where i “did it to myself” he thought i was consenting and i did, but i should’ve put the brakes on…

…i used to get into physical fights with my brother, and i used to be the “tougher” one then we fought less, an he was sexuallyharrassive to me for a time

i identify as pansexual or simply sexual, altho more attracted to males (about 70% of the time) then women. i also wanted to be a gay male for a time!

pisaquari: Can I ask why that is?

Demonista: well, it lasted from 12-about 16. i think it was me figuring out a nonoppressive sexuality, and having egalitarian sex more easy to find in gay male writings and drawings at that time than straight ones (now i think gay male materials are just as bad), but what i was reading/seeing back then of gay men’s was nonabusive, equal, not focused on anal intercourse, etc. i was rejecting heterosexuality but still attracted to men, and not finding an egalitarian vision of men-women relationships at all. and frankly, gay male depictions really “got me off.” and i often fantasized myself as a gay young man having sex with other males. so…

pisaquari: That’s really interesting. Amazing what lengths we will go to in order to salvage our ties with males

Demonista: well, i’ve only had relationships with 4 people, 3 of them male, and one a male-bodied trans woman. With one of the guys, who was my third partner, he talked the talk but didn’t walk the walk–one it’s face, the sex we had was fine politically, but if you actually knew what was going on in my head it wasn’t. i kept on trying to tell him how to manually stimulate me right, but he would always go back to it being too rough. i did have orgasms, but the pain during and for the couple of days after sure ain’t my idea of fun! blooming hell.

Demonista: Although it didn’t end well, my relationship(s) with my first two partners was really something great. i was involved with Gav first, then we broke up because he chose his boyfriend Derek over me, then they had a fight over something (can’t remember what) and they split up, and Derek started talking with me. And i didn’t really hold it against him–I knew gav was with derek, but I didn’t know they were supposed to be monogamous. and so derek and I were talking, and he told me in a roundabout way that he had a crush on me. I was floored, and well, to make a long story short it ended up being a threesome relationship for a time…

pisaquari: Do you tell your partners you’re a radical feminist and explain to them what that constitutes as far as your boundaries are concerned?

Demonista: i do… and they all nod and grin…some of them actually take it to heart. like gav and derek did. and d–my on again off again current partner–seems to get where i’m coming from.

pisaquari: any particular bad reactions upon the news of being a radical feminism?

Demonista: yes, i don’t regret either one of them, but i actually think derek was awesomer, esp at the end, obviously.

Demonista: and there has been the typical reaction to the word “radical feminist”, from both males and females.

pisaquari: how much of a learning curve do you allow people with radical feminism before you give up?

if you give any at all?

Demonista: ummm…i give them the initial freakout, and then after i give them a spiel, if they still don’t get it, i get angry. my patience for fools span lasts from a few minutes to months lol…

pisaquari: haha

quite a range

actually

Demonista: like that fucking essentialism slur…

pisaquari: hows that go?

Demonista: like “radical feminists are really cultural feminists” or “radfems are essentialist.” and i go “were not. if we thought male violence was inevitiable, we wouldn’t bother trying to change things!”

Demonista: and it’s especially angering to get that crap in my women’s studies classes! hells bells

Demonista: my declared major is women’s studies and sociology. but i’ve also taken a few courses in global studies, philosophy both

pisaquari: how do you find academia to be towards radical feminism

or what you can make of their opinions?

Demonista: fucking hell! we VERY rarely get a fair shake. ramirez, my first women’s studies prof, honours them. and my feminist theory prof, toye, did a good job describing us in class, but then she gives us all these radfem-bashing readings. for example the alcoff reading we did had two kinds of feminism: postmodernist vs “cultural” cultural meant radical–eg the list of her “cultural” feminists included dworkin, kathleen barry, adrienne rich, luce irigary, janice raymond, mary daly, robin morgan, etc. the article was bs–the whole dichotomy was rubbish, the label was rubbish, the analysis was crap. Etc Demonista: postmodernists are the darlings of women’s studies. The only course we were assigned a radfem reading was in a philosophy course (phil and gender)–we read mackinnon, patricia hill Collins

pisaquari: Do you challenge this?

Demonista: i try–i refute the bs the profs, students, and readings say a lot of the time. radical feminism is portrayed as the enemy in these classes, and complete LIES are said about it. so i tell people i id as a second-wave radical feminist, am anti-porn, believe gender is socially constructed, etc. in the face of being told that radical feminism is pretty much dead. that there are only two branches of radfem cultural and lesbian, that radfems thought girls were stupid, that we are pro-obscenity laws,.etc. WHAT BULLSHIT

pisaquari: wha???, makes no sense. I’m sure that’s an area you just have to pick your battles in and keep on moving

We could probably rant on that all night–I wanna move backwards for a minute if that’s cool with you

pisaquari: okay, so what do you think about your upbringing/past made you more open to radical feminism?

Demonista: my mom is a kinda liberal feminist. when i was 8, i first read and saw porn, and was pro-porn and pro-bdsm until i was 12. i had been sexually abused at 4-5 by a neighbour. when i was 12 i read kate millett’s sexual politics and joan smith’s misogynies. then shere hite, susan cole, etc. at 14 i read andrea dworkin, and that was the beginning of something beautiful Your browser may not support display of this image.

pisaquari: So you think it was the author’s way of clarifying your past sexual abuses that really caught you?

Demonista: hmmm…i dunno. it’s probably because it happened so long ago, and the fact that my abuser was an 8 year old boy, but i think other things shaped me far more than that. eg, the porn consumption. it had a lot to do with becoming anti-porn and anti-prostitution. another thing, when i was 12, i read patrick roscoe’s birthmarks which is short stories, some semiautobiographical, about child abuse, prostitution, drug addiction, etc. it was also a pivotal book, along with millett and smith

pisaquari: Was there a pivotal “aha” moment for you? A revelation you had that sticks out where you felt you suddenly got it?

Demonista: i have those a lot when i’m reading dworkin…i don’t remember if there was an epiphany–I remember being very struck my millett’s analysis of patriarchy, and calling out the darlings of the left in the 60s, and learning about trauma in birthmarks, and learning about peter sutcliffe (serial killer) and his normalcy in misogynies, and how sexual abuse in childhood conditions us for patriarchal sexuality and outright abuse in susan cole’s pornography and the sex crisis

pisaquari: What was it about radical feminism that took you in? (as you were once quite different it seems)

Demonista: hmmm…i was a different person before i was 12 esp, and also before i was 16. i wonder what it was? most of the books i was reading before 12 were like christopher pike, rl stine, lj smith, tamora pierce, and generally other “teen horror” books, so reading radfem books was a big shift for me in what i was reading about.

i was also reading a lot of vc andrews, some anne rice, and was consuming cinematic porn during that time. so it was a major shift in reference.

Demonista: my mom was antiporn, but for rather diff reasons than are radfems, and her moralism over it fueled my thinking it was bad, and something i should do if i wanted to be bad… and reading those books made me realize what crap that was

pisaquari: so maybe the excitement if something so different?

Demonista: i think that’s what first got me reading it–it was different and it sounded interesting

pisaquari: That’s kinda funny that could be what it comes down to

Demonista: Radical feminism was a deep, long lasting kinda of intellectual stimulation. Reading a couple points had my brain buzzing for days

perhaps we could call it The Sensation of Truth?

pisaquari: good phrase for it

pisaquari: How do we pass along radical feminism?

Demonista: learning ourselves, helping others learn, synthesize and create new theories, demonstrate through action, live it in your personal life

pisaquari: can you give a couple examples of how you “live it in your personal life”?

Demonista: i speak up about porn, rape jokes, etc in daily life (when i can work up the guts), blog about it, nurture, encourage and create sexual fantasies and acts that are in line with radfem philosophy, i am vegan, i freeganise, buy most things used, do presentations in classes against prostitution, porn, etc, engage in nonviolent direct action with indigenous solidarity, peace, corporate power, etc

pisaquari: go you!

Pisaquari: What’s been the hardest principle of radical feminism to incorporate in your life thus far?

Demonista: hmmm…well, i suppose ideas surrounding sisterhood, lesbian separatism, and political lesbianism. not that i object, it’s that i recognize that I’ve been programmed by patriarchy to be attracted to men, and to look to men for support, guidance, sex, love, etc… and i do like some men. but I recognize the need for these analyses

pisaquari: How do you keep yourself happy living in a patriarchy?

Demonista: music! books! love! revolution! sleep!

Demonista: i do get depressed sometimes, but then i just take a break from dealing for a few days, and have fun

pisaquari: Beautiful!

What’s one thing you would like to know about all the radical feminists you encounter online?

Demonista: hmmm…how they enact their beliefs in their daily and activist lives…

pisaquari: LAST Question!

Demonista: ok

pisaquari: Okay, so there is a radical feminist island–you are there now. What are you doing?

Demonista:: plotting to overthrow the patriarchy on the mainland…in between music, sleep, food, and lovely sex

Julia: Julia

pisaquari: Places you most frequent/comment (can be nonfeminist)

Julia: indymedia, womensspace, reclusive leftist, f-word uk,

pisaquari:How did male supremacy first touch you?

Julia: When I was 4 years old and saw how boys had more freedom in pre-school. My first big fight with my mother was over refusing to wear a dress to school; I wouldn’t be able to run and play without the boys trying to see my underwear. After that, she left me alone in terms of clothing, and I remember at 6 wearing a baseball uniform to a family wedding. I have long hair now and am smiling ear to ear in my Washington Senator’s uniform. This was 1969.

pisaquari: Were there any feminists closely involved in your upbringing?

Julia: Well, yes…my mother, although she had limited freedom. She taught me to aim high, supported my playing sports, even when I was the only girl on the cross country team in junior high. She once asked me if I wanted to be a Supreme Court justice. Her career ended when she met my father and she became a fulltime mother and home- maker and she hated it. She would have been a brilliant doctor; in her generation this was almost impossible, so she went to nursing school instead. She was fiery, cruel and hard to live with, but she taught me a lot about feminism and I have enormous respect for her.

pisaquari: At what age did you realize your mother was unhappy being a home-maker? Did she talk about this with you?

pisaquari: Was there an “aha” moment for you for feminism? For radical feminism?

Julia: I just came out this year as a radical feminist! I didn’t know what radical feminism meant, I thought I had to be a tough feminist activist, so I didn’t think I qualified. Now I see that I’ve been a radfem since elementary school, always standing up for women’s and girls rights. In some ways, it was easier then, in the 60s and 70s than it is now.

pisaquari: What attributes in your personality/upbringing do you think made you more open to radical feminism?

Julia: A strong sense of justice and always listening to people who have different experiences and different lives, and believing them. Learning about racism from people of color helps me understand sexism as class oppression. Learning about all oppressions does.

pisaquari: Do you call yourself a radical feminist to others?

Julia: Not always.

pisaquari: How do you integrate radical feminism into your personal relationships? Buying habits? Love? Family?

Julia: At the moment I’m mostly interested in making strong women friendships and helping other women. I have very little interest in a relationship with a man, although I’m straight. I’d much rather my energy go to my own work and to creating a big circle of women.

pisaquari: What has been the hardest part of radical feminism to integrate into your life?

Julia: That there are many strong opposing views. Like feminists who are pro-porn, equal rights feminists, women who cringe at being called feminist. The backlash was real and has done so much damage.

pisaquari: you mentioned in your first e-mail to me your travels around the world and how you were able to bring your feminism into such sexist cultures—I’d really love to hear about those! Can you provide some sort of timeline? How it happened and what you did?

pisaquari: How do you survive/find happiness living in a patriarchy? What are some things you like to do?

Julia: Nature, nature! Hiking and camping alone in the mountains. Dancing. Reading -almost exclusively women writers. Traveling. Friends.

pisaquari: What sort of activist activities are you involved with?

Julia: At the moment, very few. I’d love to organize a women’s newspaper, or a radfem stree theater group. It’s hard to organize in the liberal town I live in.

pisaquari:That sounds so awesome!