Baby, you can't drive my car: the arrest of women's right activists in Saudi Arabia.

Just yesterday, I was having a rant about how we are nowhere near the end of feminism. Only the day before, I was in tears about the Irish referendum. Today I am in tears for the women of Saudi Arabia and how we in the west can get caught up in how good we have it. People are talking about the end of feminism, whilst women are getting locked up for asking for the right to drive. Drive. A car. Not really a radical concept, is it? Imagine living in a society where your home is invaded, you are arrested, put in solitary confinement and face the death penalty for asking for something as simple as being able to drive. I don't even think about being able to drive as a basic human right. It's just so taken for granted. But this is a country so restricting the movement of women that they can't go out alone, drive, be seen with men outside of their family ... it's inconceivable really. But it is real.

These women are charged with treason and conspiracy against the state. All they are asking for is freedom of movement, independence and autonomy (women are under the guardianship of male family members) and to form refuges from domestic violence. Treason, huh?  Violation of "religious and national values". Is your head reeling yet? It bloody well should be.

A few years ago, I had a rant about the death penalty. I'm completely against the death penalty. I think once the state starts deciding when people deserve to die, other people will follow suit and justify deciding when people deserve to die. Countries with the death penalty have higher rates of violence because it demonstrates a social acceptance of violence.

However, in Australia, most people (and the government) only decide to get all up in arms about the death penalty when Australians are facing it. These women are facing the death penalty for feminist activism. They are going to be killed by the state for asking for some small portion of the rights and freedoms that we enjoy in Australia everyday. Some of these women are in their 60s and 70s. They have been fighting this shit since the 80s. I have been fighting for women's rights since not long after, but I have never faced arrest, torture and execution for it. I cannot imagine what it would be like living in a country where standing up for things I take for granted here would result in arrest, torture or execution.

Have we reached the peak of feminism because Beyonce announced she was a feminist? Fuck no. Are we about to see an end to the need for feminism? Fuck no. Anyone who spouts this needs to have a good look outside of their comfortable little bubble. I know it's hard. It horrifies me every time. But at least we are lucky enough not to be living it. And we can do these women the honour of continuing the fight even when it is not about our own lives anymore.

Haven't we been hearing about post-feminism for years?

This article: https://medium.com/@badasswomen/last-wave-of-feminism-7d707afa47a0 brings out the cynical middleaged feminist in me.

Haven't we been hearing about post-feminism for years? I figure people are either ridiculously optimistic, or blind. Think about the driving forces between each so called wave of feminism. In the 1800s, relatively privileged women fought (and suffered) for suffrage and the right to own property. Whilst women theoretically have the right to vote or represent the people around the world now (except in some religious institutions!), there are still massive barriers to participation including freedom of movement, access to transport, cultural norms discouraging or preventing participation, education, literacy, socioeconomic issues and so on. Women remain massively underrepresented in politics and other powerful institutions worldwide. And whilst those of us in the developed world benefit from improved property rights, there remain many places where legislation or societal norms restrict women's right to ownership, and hence their capacity for independence and their safety. Even here, older women remain the fastest growing population of homeless and we see increasing feminisation of poverty. Does that make you think that something more might need to be done?

Let's wander on to the 70s. A combination of radical and liberal feminist ideas took hold. Reproductive rights, the unspoken experiences of women, safety and equality became the bandwagons. I'm not going to say we haven't made a lot of progress, but really - America is going backward on access to contraception and abortion, birth and unsafe abortions are major causes of maternal death and injury in the developing world, the world is full of people telling women what they can and can't do with their bodies, attacking women and judging women for their sexuality.  I'm afraid the personal remains political.

The whole liberal feminist ideology fitted in nicely with the mainstream existing ideology, so it took hold fairly well. And why not? It certainly benefits the capitalist system to have extra workers, especially workers who remain responsible for the majority of unpaid work in our society as well. It's a double bonus for conservative society really. But we still have the wage gap, the glass ceiling, the infuriating "how can you combine work and motherhood" conversations, workplace sexual harassment and discrimination. Sorry, it seems like even this most palatable aspect of feminism seems to have a bunch of work cut out for it.

How about the 90s? Apparently I am a third wave feminist, but no one actually told me. The 90s brought into the conversation ideas about how other axes of oppression intersect with sexism, which is great - a long overdue consideration of layers of privilege, but also jumped back into the individualist focus. Postmodern ideas developed in this era remain completely remote to most of the population, who still argue about "natural" characteristics of men and women. The reclaiming of "femininity" can be useful when we use it to subvert societal norms, to participate in the reconstruction of meaning, but overall, there was a reactive response to the radicalism of the 70s and 80s and claiming it was possible to be a "real woman", "feminine" and feminist.  Feminist punk and the radical femme look challenged the concept of femininity in spectacular ways. The "I shave my legs and wear make up for me" crew, not so much. Individualism took back the power of working together, claimed business as usual could go hand in hand with feminism and reinforced the neoliberalist ideas that one's situation is all the fault of the individual, not their context. Individualism is kinda contrasting to intersectionality really.

Finally, we get to what someone has called the fourth wave. Mostly, it seems to be defined by being online. But once you look past that, it all looks pretty familiar. What are we organising around online? Freedom from sexual harassment, rape, domestic violence and workplace discrimination, the pay gap, political representation, reproductive freedom. Haven't we heard this before? There's some popularism in feminism, but how feminist is this popularism anyway? The royal wedding isn't a giant leap forward for feminism or black rights. It's an irrelevant incident in the lives of some rich and famous people that also perpetuates the problematic institutions of marriage and monarchy. When some person claims they are feminist, please look first at their actions.

Whilst it is claimed that the online movement has spread the word of feminism more broadly than ever before, it has also spread misogyny and hate. MRAs, incels, antiabortionists and conservative groups equally use the internet. Women have a history of organising together. This is not new. Sure, the internet can be a useful tool. But it's easy to be a keyboard warrior.  And similarly easy for the people threatened by their loss of privilege to yell back. There is an incredible amount of abuse of women on line, and the form and context of that abuse reflects the use of sexism to keep women in their place. This shit has not changed character, it has just changed format.

The #metoo movement was not a revelation. All women know sexual harassment and assault exists. We have be talking about it since, oh, maybe the dark ages. If anyone was not aware, it was because they weren't listening and weren't looking. But as long as we maintain an individualist focus - it's just these bad eggs - and do not challenge the culture that enables these people to justify their behaviour, not much will change. Until the #notallmen saga moves on to recognising how society enables and perpetuates this behaviour, until they stop refusing to listen to women's experiences, until they stop turning to abuse to cover their discomfort, we aren't changing much.

To claim we are on the brink of a post feminist world is to live in a bubble of privilege. Tell that to to the women kidnapped and raped by Boko Harum. To the woman living on the street. To the woman trying to access reproductive services in parts of South America. To the woman being beaten to death by her partner. Only 27 or so of them in Australia so far this year.

Feminism hasn't happened in waves. They haven't passed and been resolved.  It's more like a building tsunami. Here we are, 150 years later still fighting for the same shit. Safety, freedom, reproductive choices, equal opportunity, equal pay, hell, simply to be bloody listened to. Women (or indeed men) in positions of privilege claiming to be feminist isn't a peak of feminism. The peak will be when we don't have to say this shit anymore. When we don't have to fight. Claiming to be feminist shouldn't be a radical thing. To some extent, most people actually are. If you believe women should be treated as people not property, that women have human rights along with men, well, these outrageous notions are feminist. But agreeing with these ideas is just the surface. Underneath that, when people are really willing to look at the ways in which different sorts of oppression are built into our culture, our understanding of the world, our behaviours and attitudes, until we look at how we participate in and perpetuate those oppressions, until we take the very uncomfortable step of acknowledging that we are part of a system built around these things, and that for real change to occur, we need to think outside the neoliberalist box, this wave needs to just get bigger.

Sooky la la on the Irish referendum, voting and how prolifers can Suck My Left One.

I’m feeling strangely teary today about the Irish citizens travelling home to vote in the referendum. I thought it was just me being a sooky la la, but soon I was reading about all the other people around the world with no connection to Ireland moved by #hometovote. It is the feeling of solidarity, of people taking a stand on something so meaningful to the lives of women. But I think it’s also thinking abut what it would be like, living in a country without access to safe, legal abortion. We don’t tend to think of rich, western nations like that. And so Ireland has kind of slipped under the radar. We forget that there are places in the supposedly developed world that maintain laws, or in this case, an aspect of the constitution, that are so backward. But then, I guess we only just changed the legal definition of marriage, and NSW is only now implementing laws to protect women entering medical services offering abortions from abuse. The US is becoming just painful to think about at all. But I thought about what it would be like, in a country otherwise not dissimilar to ours, to be a woman faced with an accidental pregnancy, a pregnancy from sexual assault, a pregnancy hazardous to her health, a pregnancy she might have wanted but was economically or mentally unable to have now. And to have her agency on the future of that pregnancy negated.

I can’t believe that Ireland doesn’t have a postal or away voting system. But I am so impressed at how many people are actually making the trip home in order to repeal a ridiculous article of their constitution that should never have been allowed to pass in 1983 in the first place. It makes me feel slightly better about the world.  And I’m pretty bloody cynical about the world. It also reminds me why I am a fan of voting. I know our political system sucks. It’s a skewed form of representation with very limited options, but if we don’t use it while it’s all we’ve got, we won’t get anything better. Not voting because we are disillusioned or apathetic leads to Trumps and Brexits.

These people are so engaged in their power to change Ireland that they are travelling home to vote.  Is it the Irish? Is it the issue? Maybe people who have real lived experience of the effect of oppressive laws are more engaged in change.  Why did the British not all rush home to vote against Brexit? Or the Americans against Trump? Australians against Tony Abott? Maybe after 35 years of the LNP in Australia, people might have suffered enough to rise up against it.

The passing of this article in 1983 that has been so solidly debunked now shows the power of misinformation and subjective wording of legislation.  In the face of post voting reality, it is also unlikely Brexit would pass, nor that Trump would be elected either. Australia would be a republic if not for the wording of our referendum designed to sway people against the republic. Our votes can be powerful, but we also need to clearly understand what we are voting on. Political ignorance feeds the emotional reaction to misinformation and misleading campaigns that the powerful rely on.

It sounds so boring of me to be pro voting. It's much more fun to be antiestablishment. But right now, voting is one tool we have to express our disagreement and not voting doesn’t change things. It just lets those sufficiently invested in the system to vote for its perpetuation do so without obstacle. Do the antiestablishment shit too. Protest. Boycott. Buck the norms. Break unjust rules. Speak up and fight back. Be loud and outrageous.  But keep using the system to our advantage as well.

Prolifers have always astounded me. What part of life is there is sustaining the body of a braindead woman because she is host to a foetus? To refuse to perform a dilation and curette on a woman who was miscarrying until she dies of septicaemia? In locking up a woman for life for having a miscarriage because she may have actually attempted to procure an abortion? This is real shit happening to real women, in rich developed nations, this decade. Women on chemotherapy have their treatment stopped if their period is late. Think about that for a second. Monitoring women’s cycles and withholding life saving but teratogenic treatment on the basis that a late period may be a pregnancy when there are a gazillion other reasons why a woman might be late. It gives a possible pregnancy at such an early stage that many women miscarry without even knowing it priority over the very definite life and life threatening illness of the woman.

The effect of prolife arguments is always further control of women.  A sperm is also a precursor of life. And men waste millions of them every day. Stop wanking, for the sake of the unborn children! Stop having sex for non-procreative purposes! Stop, well, just existing … Human bodies produce the cells that might lead to more people everyday. The vast majority of them don’t lead to more people. Let the actual people affected by those cells make decisions on their own lives and bodies.

The Irish have taken a real pro life stance. Pro the lives of women, their right to bodily autonomy, towards removing state and religious control over women’s lives. Yes, I know that millions of women around the world still lack access to safe, legal, affordable contraception and abortion. But this is another step, and it’s been a hugely public and positive step.

Next time someone starts blurting right to life stuff at you, please, sing them Every Sperm is Sacred. And maybe Suck my Left One. Because when I’m not feeling soppy about the solidarity shown with Irish women this week, I’m feeling really pissed off with people thinking they have some right to women’s bodies.

Here we go again: how sexism in climbing is reflected in the denial of sexism in climbing

It is with a great sigh of resignation that find myself I yet again entering a discussion about “are climbers sexist?”, stimulated by this article: https://medium.com/@georgieabel/sasha-digulian-joe-kinder-and-the-reframing-of-normal-b0e70d933642. The short answer is, well, yes. But every time someone attempts to discuss that sexism might possibly be embedded in larger systems than individuals, there is a chorus of “not all men”. Since when did anyone say all and every single man? I can name incredibly feminist male climbers. I can name quite a lot more incredibly sexist and quite scary climbers. But we are not talking individuals.

Climbing is not a little bubble. Climbers are drawn from a broader patriarchal society that is also racist, classist, homophobic and ableist. These days, most climbers are not even the social renegades we like to think we were. Gyms and sport climbing has led to the participation of vast numbers of incredibly mainstream people, and they bring with them their experience and worldviews from growing up and living in our society. Even radical left social movements are not immune from forms of prejudice and unacceptable behaviour, as a little research into sexism in environmental and socialist movements will find for you as well. Similarly, the older and more radical ends of the climbing spectrum are not free from sexist behaviour. Ways in which people talk, relate and make assumptions may all reflect sexism and when you have been around climbing for as long as I have, listing off examples just gets tedious, because they are so common.

Now, I agree Georgie generalises a little in her article. What is obvious to someone who has lived experience of being a woman in climbing with a background knowledge of gender theory, postmodernism and intersectional feminism, is that Georgie is also writing from that position. And without that background, her article may seem a little thin in spots. And before everyone complains further about the grading system comment, I believe that idea originated from a man https://mojagear.com/journal/2015/12/23/dude-grades-a-look-at-sexism-in-climbing-grades/ . But again, listing of examples just gets incredibly tedious. What would be really nice sometimes is if women were just believed.

But what tends to happen is that the few incidents that the “not all men” brigade acknowledge are written off as individual rather than systemic problems. And the women’s voices that are listened to are the ones who describe problems as individual rather than systemic. I am also really bored of saying I don’t hate men. I think everyone around me is pretty clear that I am actually rather fond of men. That is not incompatible with stating that these men were raised and function within a patriarchal system. Most of them don’t want to be actively sexist or oppressive, but some have more awareness of their position, privilege and participation in the perpetuation of the system than others.

When women say, this man’s behaviour was not OK, but really, men in climbing are great, they get pats on the back. Brave women, pointing out sexism but supporting the “not all men”. But what Georgie is trying to point out is that these men’s behaviour occurs in a context where they feel their behaviour is OK. People don’t tend to do stuff they feel will get them socially ostracised. Which suggests that these individuals felt their behaviour was sufficiently acceptable to their surrounding community to engage in it. When people support women for speaking up about these incidents, they are demonstrating that a certain level of blatant sexism, sexual harassment and assault is not acceptable. That’s a good start. However, when they proceed to go on to claim that women talking about a more general, more subtly entrenched culture of sexism is divisive, well, I’m sorry, but you are demonstrating the problem. It’s divisive for women to talk about sexism but not divisive to deny their experiences and call them divisive? It is not the responsibility of women to nicefy the world and make it palatable to you. Everyone has different experience, beliefs, values and viewpoints. When you happen to be of the dominant one telling another less privileged one that they are wrong and just being disruptive, well, it’s a bit of a giveaway of what's going on to me.

It's not always about rampant orgies, but it's actually OK if it is, too.

So SBS did a thing about open relationships: https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/video/1213134403843.

It's actually not too bad. Whilst they do get a little obsessed about how it works and who sleeps where, they did manage to avoid engaging in the sort of negative and abusive commentary that people on Facebook and Twitter later failed to refrain from. Although it appears they haven’t sunk to death and rape threats that tend to follow any feminist commentary online. Congratulations to the people brave enough to expose themselves to these trolls.

The general public do get focussed about sex and jealousy in open relationships; this is all the naughty and exciting stuff in people's minds. But what was only briefly mentioned in the show that I think is crucial in changing our of perspective on relationships is how forms of polyamory, open relationships or relationship anarchy are pragmatic and political. Talking about love, communication, respect, consideration, boundaries, scheduling and practicalities does a bit to help people see it's not all rampant orgies, but they really are important to any sort of relationship. Relationships are work. They are constant negotiation and consideration of another person. Pointing out that we do the same sorts of things in open relationships is only one step in getting people to question how and why our society became so attached to monogamy and how in most cases monogamy is really a myth.

Have any of the self-righteous proponents of monogamy had a look at modern relationship statistics? What people hold up as an ideal is far from the reality. Most relationships end and most relationships involve infidelity. I remain flabbergasted at the cognitive dissonance displayed by people getting married for the 2^nd, 6^th, 8^th times, making yet another vow that they will be faithful to that person until death do they part. Given that lifelong monogamous relationships almost never happen, some form of open relationship is an honest, pragmatic way of having a relationship. If people are going to have affairs or leave someone for another, are we not better off talking about this stuff honestly and openly than hiding and lying? We have already diversified our ideas of how relationships have to look. Relationships can involve different permutations living together, childrearing, sharing finances, celebrations of commitment and being of different sexes. Why not diversify them to anything that any number of consenting adults agree them to be? What a relationship means and how it works are things that should be negotiated by the participants in it, not by society, law and religion. And before anyone carries on about animals, children or the harbour bridge, note I said "consenting adults".

Open relationships are also a political choice. Monogamy isn't "natural". How the hell are we do say what is natural, whilst writing on the Internet from the comfort of our houses, munching on processed food? We are so far removed from natural that it is impossible to say what it is anymore. However, we can observe a lot of social structures reinforcing monogamy. Religion, law, government agencies and patriarchy may have a little hand there. Normal everyday exposure to films, books, fairy tales and music lyrics continues to promote this vision of a "natural" relationship.  I get that people feel that it is natural, because it is all they have been told all their lives. Years of exposure to ideas and behaviours normalises them. But monogamy has always had exceptions for men. Polygyny, concubines, mistresses, prostitutes - these are ways in which society has accepted non monogamy for men, because men are supposedly more sexual beings. They have needs. They are unable to control them. Evolutionary psychology blethers on about how men want to sew their seeds as broadly as possible whilst women want to find one man to protect and provide for them. Blah blah blah. Monogamy is a form of control of women. It ensured ownership of women passed from father to husband, provided certainty of parentage for men to hand on their property. It perpetuated stories about women being less sexual beings whilst implementing a bunch of practices and laws to contain women's sexuality (FGM, chastity belts, treatments for ”hysteria”, burkas, witch hunts, honour killings, beheading and stoning “unfaithful” women, the list goes on … ).

And strangely enough, the rate of marriage breakdown has escalated with social and economic changes that enabled women's independence. When women are able to make choices to leave relationships they are not happy in, they do. 

The other political aspect of polyamory (in its most open guises at least) is it says that we have no right to control what our partners do with their bodies and emotions. Indeed, it's a bit hopeless pretending to do so at all. No amount of saying "you can only be attracted to me" or indeed telling yourself "I will only ever be attracted to this person from now on" is going to stop a basic physiological reaction. Controlling behaviour is unacceptable. Even though people are voluntarily entering into these unspoken agreements about relationships, they are part of spectrum of controlling behaviours that most of us will acknowledge are unacceptable. We have just chosen a place on that spectrum of what controlling behaviour is ok and what isn't. I don’t think it’s ok to tell someone who they can and can’t have sex with or what they are allowed to feel for other people. Jealousy isn’t a sign of love. It’s a sign of insecurity, entitlement, possessiveness, fear or unmet needs, all of which are issues that need to be addressed no matter what format your relationship takes.

I find people in polyamorous relationships tend talk about how it is all about love. There are parts that are about love. I'm happy to agree that we can love as any people as we damn well want, if we are lucky enough to meet those people at the right time and stages in all of our lives.   I find it challenging when we focus on the love side, however, because it tends to feed justifying lifestyle choices in the terms of the traditional morality of relationships. It makes our choices sound acceptable according to the terms of the critics. But it is also about sex. Because, let's face it, sex is fun. Dating is fun. We freely admit that we have sex for fun these days. We admit to finding other people attractive. Those of us born after 1968 grew up in a world that is much more accepting of serial relationships, premarital sex, casual sex, friends with benefits. Why do we still accept a prohibition on ever having sex with another person again? It’s not depraved to experience and act upon normal, healthy sexual desires. It’s not shameful. It’s not wrong. When we don’t talk about open relationships involving acceptance of sexuality, we continue to buy into the idea that feeling desire and attraction outside of limited contexts is wrong. Sexual practices can be anything any number of adults able to give consent freely choose to participate in. Plenty of people think those rampant orgies are fun too, and that's OK.

Our world moralises and controls sexuality, perpetuates stereotypes about men’s and women’s desires and needs, denies female sexual agency and men’s capacity for emotional expression and communication. Open relationships are a very pleasant change from the double standards of male and female sexuality we have been subjected to, where it is acknowledged that women too have desires and men have the capacity to feel emotions and communicate.