2 minute read
Self care and collective care as a radical practice
Aizat
What did I learn at BFI? It taught me transformational processes and radical self care for oneself and others.
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And it is politically important to learn how to treat yourself well in order to treat others well in turn. Society very rarely allows us to talk about our emotions, our feelings and experiences, and we are filled with these things every single second of our lives. But this is a long process that never ends.
We often regard conflicts as something bad, something that should lead to some kind of disaster. People don’t want to speak of, discuss or remember conflicts. We do not know how to accept them or give them space to exist. We do not know what non-violent communication is. Our anger, disagreement, rage can be beautiful too. It is the path that led us to feminism and to the betterment of humanity. I want to share an example that I remember very well. Once we were having an online call with my colleagues, and an argument started among the participants. I was neutral in this situation, but I couldn’t take it anymore and told them to get lost. I regretted it right away, because I hadn’t practiced such an attitude at work before and thought that I would be fired. But in response, I received a caring letter from the team, which recommended that I rest. I was shocked and did not know how to express my gratitude. We are used to being punished for uncomfortable behavior and emotions. BFI never fired anyone and never punished anyone.
Saadat
There were times in the collective that your activism wouldn’t necessarily guarantee protection in your activities. The activist’s work is a conscious and deliberate construction of her life in her own way, consisting of resistance to the patriarchal requirements for women. Attacks and threats against activists and human rights defenders occur regularly. Sometimes they are large in scale and impact. In my case, this took the form of a direct attack on myself and my colleagues on March 8th by an aggressive mob. I did not want to stop even though my life was under threat. I had nothing to lose but my freedom. My desire to be part of the feminist movement and support other women was only strengthened.
