Growing Strong 2019 - Sydney Uni Women's collective journal 2019

GROWING STRONG 2018

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GROWING STRONG 2019

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF COUNTRY The University of Sydney’s Wom*n’s Collective meets and organises on the unceded land of the Gadigal people of the Eora nation. We would like to pay our respects to Elders, past, present and emerging, and acknowledge that sovereignty was never ceded.

As a feminist collective, USyd WoCo stands against the colonial violence that began with European invasion and exists to this very day. Colonisation brought with it dispossession, destruction of culture and language, abduction, rape, exploitation and murder, and in 2019 we acknowledge that the effects of these actions have transcended time.

In 2007 Kevin Rudd said “sorry” for the Stolen Generations, and yet since then the rates of Indigenous child removal have risen over 400%.

It was only at the end of 2018 that the Liberal coalition government and the complicit Labor Party put through a law that allows for the adoption of thousands of children from the state’s foster care system, without parental consent.

Indigenous children and young people already makeup over 40% of those in the out-of-home care system.

It is these racist laws and useless apologies that demonstrate the ongoing effects of the colonisation of Indigenous people.

As intersectional feminists, USyd WoCo understands the need to prioritise the voices of Indigenous women and gender non-conforming people in our activism. There is no justice or liberation without resisting against colonisation and dismantling the oppressive structures it has created. There is no justice or liberation without supporting and uplifting Indigenous peoples voices. There is no justice until we are all liberated.

This land always was, and always will be, Aboriginal land.

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EDITORIAL Hello, and thank you for taking the time to pick up a copy of Growing Strong 2019. This edition has been a painstaking effort, but we are incredibly proud of the end result. A collection of incredible authors and artists have put their time into creating what is an accumulation of the current ideas of the feminist movement. From the fight for better sex education to the political conversations around International Women’s Day, we bring you a snapshot into the current political discourse of socialist feminism. As a collective we believe that these ideas are important to share. In a world that is scary and confusing, and on the edge of what seems like a period of intense change, we have come together to try and shape the world into one we would like to live in. This magazine is a reflection of that, a reflection of the ideas we believe in and are pushing for through our activism.

We hope that no matter who you are or where you come from, that something within these 32 pages will inspire you, make you question yourself or teach you something new.

Happy reading, Jazzlyn Breen and Layla Mkh, Convener’s of the USyd Women’s Collective and Editors in Chief of Growing Strong 2019.

CONTENTS Cover art - (Paola Ayre)

Page 18 - Exit Signs (Donnalyn Xu)

Page 4 - Useful definitions

Page 19 - Black Angels Do Exist (Kiki Amberber)

Page 5 - What is the women’s collective?

Page 20 - Speaking to the city where she walked (Elizabeth Mora)

Page 6 - Guilty until proven innocent?

(Holly Brooke)

Page 22 - Rosa Luxemburg (Sophie Haslam) Page 24 - horoscope for lost souls (Donnalyn Xu)

Page 8 - The radical history of international women’s day (Harriet Grayson) Page 9 - Here’s to the whores who made history (Words and art; Paola Ayre)

Page 24 - Artwork by (Ranuka Tandan) Page 25 - Bitching? (Harriet Jane) Page 26 - An intergenerational and intersectional perspective on mental health (Layla Mkh)

Page 12 - Moving Beyond Consent (Lara Sonnenschein) Page 14 - High school sex ed f*cking sucks (Anonymous)

Page 29 - No one is born a perfect feminist (Klementine Burrell-Sander)

Page 16 - Rituals (Mavis Tian)

Page 30 - Neoliberal self care is bullshit (Words and art; Jazzlyn Breen)

Page 17 - Crescendo (Amani Mahmoud)

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S L U N F O I E S T I U N I F E D

ABLEISM: Devaluing and discriminating against people with physical, intellectual, or psychiatric disabilities.

BINARY: Relating to, composed of, or involving two things. When we use the term ‘binary’ in feminist discussion, it is usually in relation to gender (i.e: gender binary) and the limiting belief that there are only two genders.

MALE GAZE: A way of looking at the world through a masculine lens that views women as sexual objects.

MANSPLAIN: A man explaining something to someone, typically a woman, in a manner regarded as condescending or patronising.

MISOGYNY: Dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women.

MRAs: Men’s rights activists, usually refers to those who veil their hate for feminism and women with the guise of ‘fighting for men’s equal rights’.

NON-BINARY: An umbrella term for people who don’t identify as female/male or woman/man.

CIS/CISGENDER: Relating to a person whose sense of personal identity and gender corresponds with their assigned sex at birth.

PATRIARCHY: A system of society or government in which men hold the power and women are largely excluded from it.

COLONIAL: The invasion and control of lands inhabited by other cultures and societies. In relation to Australia, the term colonial is used in relation to European control of the governing systems.

PRIVILEGE: A special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group.

DIASPORA: People dispersed or settled in a country far from their country of ancestral origins.

GASLIGHT: Manipulate (someone) by psychological means into doubting their own sanity. Gaslighting is a form of psychological abuse where the perpetrator makes the victim believe that they are imagining things, when in fact the perpetrator is manipulating the situation to gain control.

GENDERED LABOUR: The way work is divided between men and women according to their gender roles is usually referred to as the ‘gendered division of labour’. This does not necessarily concern only paid employment, but more generally the work, tasks and responsibilities that are assigned to women and men in their daily lives, and which may, on their turn, also determine certain patterns in the labour market.

GENDER ROLES: Expectations assigned to each gender (usually the binary male and female).

HETERONORMATIVE: Relating to a world view that promotes heterosexuality as the normal or preferred sexual orientation.

INTERNALIZED SEXISM: When the belief in women’s inferiority becomes part of one’s own worldview and selfconcept.

INTERSECTIONALITY: The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.

RAPE CULTURE: A society or environment whose prevailing social attitudes have the effect of normalising or trivialising sexual assault and abuse.

SEX POSITIVE: An attitude that views sexual expression and sexual pleasure, if it’s healthy and consensual, as a good thing.

SWERF: Sex Worker Exclusionary Radical Feminist.

TERF: Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist.

TOXIC MASCULINITY: A social science term that describes narrow repressive typeS of ideas about the male gender role, that defines masculinity as exaggerated masculine traits like being violent, unemotional, sexually aggressive, and so forth.

TRANSPHOBIA: Prejudice toward trans people.

TRANSMISOGYNY: A blend of transphobia and misogyny, which manifests as discrimination against “trans women and trans and gender nonconforming people on the feminine end of the gender spectrum.”

TW: Trigger warning WHITE FEMINISM: A brand of feminism centred around the ideals and struggles of primarily white women.

WOMEN OF COLOUR (WoC): A political term to unite women from marginalized communities of colour who have experienced oppression.

VICTIM-BLAMING: When the victim of a crime or harmful act is held fully or partially responsible for it.

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WHAT IS THE WOMEN’S COLLECTIVE? The University of Sydney Wom*n’s Collective (WoCo) is an intersectional, feminist, activist group who are most active around issues of sexual assault on campus and abortion rights. We have existed for over 50 years on campus and are committed to continually improving the lives of women and non-binary students.

We recognise that all oppression is interconnected and stems from a place of exploitation under an unfair capitalist system.

We strive to work with, and uplift the voices of all intersections of persecuted identities in order to create a better world in which equality is achieved.

We are an inclusive and welcoming space and encourage all feminist students to get involved with our collective.

We meet weekly to discuss activism, current events, feminist theory and other related topics. We hold protests, reading groups, social events, talks, film screenings and more.

To get involved, visit our Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter, or send us an email!

Facebook: University of Sydney Women’s Collective Twitter: @USydWoCo Instagram: @USydWoCo Email: usydwomenscollective@gmail.com

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GUILTY UNTIL PROVEN INNO CENT? Roughly 1 in 5 women and 1 in 20 men have experienced sexual assault since the age of 15, and 93% of perpetrators of such assaults are men. Only 19% of sexual assaults are reported to the police, and of those, only 17% result in a conviction (equaling roughly 3% of all sexual assaults).

This is despite the fact that an analysis of ten years’ worth of reports concludes that rates of false allegations of sexual assault are a figure between 2% and 10% (the higher end of these estimates includes as “false allegations” cases where a victim-survivor in the course of reporting unintentionally reports an incorrect version of events).

It is abundantly clear that obscene numbers of sexual violations occur, and almost never result in either punishment or rehabilitation for the perpetrator, or justice for the survivor. Many progressive critiques have been written on the failures of the police and court system, and prejudice in our society, that lead to statistics such as those above.

For the purposes of this article I assume familiarity with some of these critiques, and with the many cases in which significant evidence points to perpetrators’ guilt and yet still there is no justice. This article looks at the ways in which progressive institutions, communities and collectives approach allegations of sexual violence, outside of the mechanisms of the state, and aims more to provoke thought and to raise questions than to attempt to suggest definitive answers.

For many institutions that receive and investigate allegations of sexual violence, the forms of evidence that are accepted as valid in forming “proof” of allegations often are impossible to procure, or simply do not exist. There are rarely witnesses. Sometimes, despite immeasurable psychological trauma, there is no physical injury on the victim. The forms of evidence that are available are regularly demeaned and overlooked. Victims’ own testimonies, painstakingly drawn out of often traumatised people multiple times and under intense scrutiny, are often torn to shreds, and those of their psychologists, friends or family are not accepted at all, or given very little weight. This leaves a significant number of sexual assault claims lacking sufficient or appropriate evidence to be accepted by those investigating claims as “proven”.

“Innocent until proven guilty” is accepted by many as a cornerstone to justice. The question is, however, whose innocence is to be presumed: the survivor’s, or the accused’s?

and vice versa: an assault cannot both have happened and not have happened. Once an allegation of sexual misconduct is made, repercussions based on the assumption of guilt for one party or the other then follow.

Survivors who speak out about sexual violence face immense repercussions for doing so - even when their allegations are accompanied by an arbitrary ‘sufficient’ amount of proof. Those coming forward with claims “lacking sufficient evidence” (which covers almost all circumstances of sexual abuse) are often harshly punished: with loss of friends and community, loss of reputation, loss of employment, loss of access to spaces the accused perpetrator inhabits, legal threats of defamation action, and more. This is why many never report at all - for instance, journalist Ashleigh Raper recently explicitly cited many of these as her reasons for choosing not to make public sexual misconduct allegations against former NSW Labor leader Luke Foley.

A survivor’s loss of employment, or loss of access to community or organisation spaces as a result of experiencing and reporting sexual violence doesn’t necessarily look like being formally stood down. It is often far more insidious: from threats made directly by the perpetrator, to friends and allies of the perpetrator publicly slandering the survivor or their motivations thus making the survivor’s continued employment or involvement untenable; or to the simple failure of an organisation to remove an aggressor from spaces the survivor inhabits. In the aftermath of being sexually violated it can be paralysingly traumatic to be in the same spaces as the perpetrator: the perpetrator’s

Belief in the innocence of those accused of sexual violence inherently implies belief that the person making the accusation is guilty of fabricating a claim,

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“Innocent until proven guilty” is accepted by many as a cornerstone to justice. The question is, however, whose innocence is to be presumed: the survivor’s, or the accused’s?

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continued presence can constitute for all intents and purposes the expulsion of the survivor from the space.

When allegations are brought to a political organisation, community or workplace, the stakes are far lower for the alleged perpetrator than when reports are made to the police: the accused is not threatened with loss of liberty or a criminal record. Those consequences that are in some cases potentially faced by perpetrators should they be found guilty, look strikingly similar to some of those consequences immediately met by many who come forward to allege sexual violence: loss of reputation, loss of employment, loss of friends and community.

There is a furor about the possibility of depriving those accused of sexual violence of such liberties until there is absolute evidence proving their guilt, despite no similar outrage about the fact that these things are readily deprived from the accuser immediately upon allegations being made, or even immediately upon the assault having taken place.

“Belief in the innocence of those accused of sexual violence inherently implies belief that the person making the accusation is guilty of fabricating a claim...”

Many abusive men and their supporters take “presumption of innocence” as a platform from which to denigrate survivors’ character and motives, paint them as guilty of maliciously fabricating allegations without any evidence to suggest, let alone prove, this guilt. Clearly, the right to “presumption of innocence” in cases of sexual violence is a right granted to powerful men but not to the survivors who speak out against them. Survivors are instead often automatically presumed guilty of fabricating claims until “proven” innocent - proof which is often impossible to provide through investigations stacked against victims.

When there is no definitive “proof” either that an assault has occurred, or that the allegation that it occurred was fabricated, a political choice must be made as

to whose innocence it is right to presume. Remaining ‘neutral’ is impossible: by the time a report is made the survivor is already experiencing ramifications, and to attempt neutrality is generally to stand by the status quo and tacitly endorse such ramifications.

Evidence - provided in the first paragraph of this article and abundantly across decades of research - shows that when a report of sexual violence is made, on balance of probabilities, the assault is overwhelmingly likely to have occurred as the victim-survivor states that it has.

It is a political grounding steeped in rape culture and misogyny that means that when there is a choice that must be made as to whose innocence to presume, the decision considered most natural and most right almost always falls on the side that is statistically significantly improbable.

I would like to credit “The Revolution Starts at Home” and “Silent no longer: confronting sexual violence in the left”, as well as invaluable conversations with many trusted friends, for helping to shape my views on this issue.

Words: Holly Brooke 007

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THE RADICAL HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY On any given day, the streets of Europe are teeming with a steady stream of pedestrians. However, on Friday, March 8th, they took on a very different appearance. Women of all ages, ethnicities and gender identities flooded the streets, marching side by side in a sea of purple. Chants of “when women stop, everything stops” and “there are 1,000 reasons” resounded through the crowds.

This was the face of International Women’s Day, as hundreds of thousands of women took part in a global protest against the manifoldly sexist and repressive neoliberal order.

International Women’s Day was first inspired by the 1908 garment workers’ strikes in New York City. 15,000 women, many of whom were immigrants, left work on March 8 to march through the Lower East Side for increased wages, shorter workdays and an end to child labour.

Their struggle inspired other women to stage a three-month strike in London a year later, fighting against exploitative sweatshops. Workers in the strike, some as young as sixteen, stared down police in the dead of winter in order for their demands to be heard. It is strikes like these that urged German feminist Clara Zetkin to propose a day marking working women’s international solidarity at the International Socialist Congress in Copenhagen in 1910. With the unanimous agreement of her fellow delegates, International Women’s Day was born. A year later, one million women commemorated the first IWD by flooding streets across

Europe to demand their rights.

Though IWD has since been sullied by rampant corporatisation and vapid, entrepreneurial brunches, at least some of its radical tradition has been preserved in the monumental strikes that swept the world earlier this year.

In the space of a single day, women from Greece to Brazil marched through the streets, their numbers ranging from the thousands to the tens of thousands to the millions. The issues they protested were similarly varied, covering not only pay equity and workplace injustices but also sexual abuse, reproductive justice, misogyny and racism. In Brazil, for example, tens of thousands of protesters consolidated many of these

was so great that men were forced to organise care centres and carry out the tasks typically provided by women.

Public strikes were ignited across Greece, fuelled largely by outrage at EU austerity measures that gutted funding to the public sector. This sector included a number of female dominated workforces, such as childcare and education, who suffer these cuts manifoldly with the added imposition of unpaid labour in the home. These austerity measures also served to lower women’s wages and dissolved social safety nets such as welfare payments, confining women to crippling economic dependence upon their partners or bosses. Such is the “crisis of social reproduction” u n d e r neoliberalism, one we can see insidiously enacted upon women on a global scale.

“Though IWD has since been sullied by rampant corporatisation and vapid, entrepreneurial brunches, at least some of its radical tradition has been preserved in the monumental strikes that swept the world earlier this year.” issues into a general rally against Bolsonaro and his appalling far-right regime. In Guatemala, hundreds of women gathered to protest decades of rape, torture and murder by the state against Indigenous women. Many of these women were themselves subject to this horrendous abuse, being members of the Indigenous, transgender or other marginalised communities. In Spain women came out in the millions to decry pay and job discrimination and the misogynist violence which is pervasive across the country. More than 5 million workers went on strike for hours at a time, if not all day, supported by the two main union federations. Their absence

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It is these strikes that epitomise International Women’s Day at its core. It was not a day envisioned for the likes of Hillary Clinton or Sheryl Sandberg to masquerade as ‘feminist’ in order to sell a few more autobiographies.

Neither is it a day for companies like Dove to veil their rapacious exploitation of women workers by marketing a few women of colour in their advertisements with a message of ‘empowerment’. IWD was, and clearly remains, a day for working class women to empower themselves in the face of oppression.

Words: Harriet Grayson

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H E R E’S T O T HE W HO R E S WHO M A DE H I S T O RY A R T A N D W O R D S : PAO L A AY R E Whore. Harlot. Jezabel. Scarlet woman. Nearly all women who exert sexual autonomy and power have been ascribed such labels throughout history. Commonly known as the Madonna / Whore complex, the notion that chaste, virtuous women and sexually autonomous women are mutually exclusive has been a pervasive and harmful myth since biblical times and beyond.

Powerful women have always straddled this illusory dichotomy - at once worshipped and reviled, feared and exalted. Salacious reputations have been falsely attributed to many historical female figures. However, it is true that many women (contemporary and ancient) have indeed utilised and harnessed their sexual prowess and cunning intelligence in order to navigate the deeply unequal power structures of society on their own terms. Some of these women were not afforded the luxury of going into sex work in its various forms by choice but out of economic necessity or noble obligation. Nevertheless, patriarchal class dynamics were subverted and it was these women who often exercised the most freedom and autonomy within pre-modern societies - having not been bound to a single man or household. This piece serves as a celebratory testament to the intelligence, wit and courage of several historical icons who attained such liberation. Here’s to the courtesans, concubines and prostitutes who have enthralled the world since time immemorial.

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ASPASIA (470-410 BC) Aspasia attained fame as the long term lover of Pericles, the great Athenian statesmen who presided during the ‘Golden Age’ of Athens. It is little acknowledged however that it was she who helped write most of Pericles speech’s, coached him on his famed oratorical skills and heavily influenced political decision making. The age old adage that “Behind every great man is a great woman” rings true. Born in Miletus, Aspasia received a high quality and thorough education - a rarity for women of her time. She then integrated herself into the upper echelons of Athenian society as a ‘Hetaira’ meaning a courtesan of high social esteem. Ancient Greek society was highly patriarchal and Athenian women were largely confined to the domestic sphere and forbidden to engage in public matters. Aspasia however took full advantage of the privileges afforded to her as a foreign born, educated and financially independent woman. Renowned for her intellectual prowess, Aspasia held her own in debates with famed academics and philosophers of her era. Guests would even bring friends and wives to her residence for the sheer experience of watching her converse. Most notable of these guests was Socrates. In Platos Symposium, Socrates states he learned everything he knows of love based off a wise woman he met in his 20s, this fictionalised character known as Diotima is widely regarded by academics to be a thinly veiled reference to Aspasia.

If this is indeed true, Aspasia’s teachings lay at the heart of the Socratic concept of Platonic love and the legacy of western philosophy and democracy owes much to Aspasia.

Proving the title of philosopher and courtesan, sex worker and intellectual was not and never will be mutually exclusive.

WU ZETIAN (624 - 705) Rising from the ranks of junior concubine to empress regnant, Wu Zetian is forever immortalised as a brilliantly capable and accomplished leader. As the only official female empress in Chinese history, she oversaw major expansion to the Tang empire and transformed the government from a militant aristocracy into an ordered scholarly bureaucracy. Already renowned for her wit and intelligence by the age of 13, she was summoned to the royal court to serve as the concubine of Emperor Taizong. Wu controversially became the favoured concubine of the new emperor when his predecessor died, eschewing the life of a monastery nun as was expected of widowed concubines at the time. She eventually ascended the noble ranks to become Empress consort, Empress dowager and finally Empress regent. Significant accomplishments of her rule include the adoption of Buddhism over Taoism as the state religion, which had major historical implications for both China and the rest of Asia. Wu Zetian also over saw the societal elevation of women, appointing scholars to write about accomplished women of Chinese history and fought hard against socially engrained Confucian thought that largely relegated women to subservient, domestic roles.

Wu Zetian has been painted as a cruel, blood thirsty leader by mainly male scholars. Ruthless as her methods may have

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been, in truth, she was not unlike the numerous ambitious male rulers throughout Chinese history and the world. Her reign was in fact marked by prosperity and peace; her political skills involving more covert manipulation than bloody force, indeed including the powers of charm and seduction.

PHRYNE (365 - 310 BC) Like her predecessor Aspasia, Phryne was a renowned Athenian courtesan. Said to rival Aphrodite in beauty, she was also a fixture of philosophic and academic circles of her time - famed for her humorous wit and sharpness of intellect.

Acclaimed sculptor Praxiteles based many of his sculptures on her figure, thus many of the traditional depictions of Aphrodite the goddess of beauty and love are in fact based upon this esteemed fourth century courtesan. Phryne eventually started veiling herself in public, so that only those who paid could witness her beauty first hand. Most infamously, she is known for her highly sensationalised court trial, in which she was charged with religious impiety: as an offering to the gods she stripped and descended into the ocean at the Festival of Poseidon. Having lost the trial, she supposedly undressed before the jury with her defence lawyer stating they could not possibly charge with immorality “A prophetess and priestess of Aphrodite”. Enthralled and struck by superstitious panic, the jury immediately acquitted her. Towards the end of her life, Phryne had amassed so much wealth that she supposedly offered to fund the rebuilding of the walls of Thebes on the condition they be entitled “Destroyed by Alexander, restored by Phryne the courtesan”. The prudent Thebian government refused such an offer but Phryne’s legacy still remains and served as inspiration for many contemporary artists and writers, including Charles Baudelaire.

EMPRESS THEODORA (500 – 548) Empress Theodora is remarkable in the fact that she came from truly humble origins, born to an actress and a circus bear tamer. Theodora subsequently started her career not as a high class courtesan but in a Constantinople brothel, serving low status customers. However, she ascended to the most grand status afforded to women in the ancient world - becoming both empress and saint. At 16, Theodora left the brothel and spent several years travelling as a companion to a Syrian official.

She then joined an ascetic Christian cult in Egypt before moving back to Constantinople and renouncing her former life to become a wool spinner. She soon met Justinian, soon to be emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire. Immediately attracted by her intellect and charm, he had a specific law created to legalise marriage to actresses - which in those days fell under the umbrella of sex work. Theodora became an empress at just 27 years. More impressive than her mere meteoric rise to power was her strong talent and influence within all government matters. She corresponded regularly with foreign envoys and her name is mentioned in almost all legislation passed during her reign. So much was her impact that Justinian referred to her as “Partner in my deliberations”.

Theodora was also a staunch feminist by modern standards,

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remembered as one of the first rulers to advocate the rights of women, legislate anti sex trafficking laws and alter divorce laws for the greater benefit of women. In her death she was honoured with sainthood by the Eastern Orthodox Church and her legacy is honoured on November 14 each year.

Chica Da Silva’s ‘rags to riches’ tale is immortalised in an internationally successful 1996 telenovela and she is regarded as a unique folk icon of almost mythic proportions.

MAH LAQA BAI (1768 – 1824)

CHICA DA SILVA (1732-1796) Born to a Portuguese father and African mother, Chica grew up enslaved and was sold to several high ranking Portuguese men in her youth. Despite this heavily disadvantaged upbringing, Chica fought hard to overcome racial and sexist stigma. She became famously powerful in colonial Brazil, managing to rise social ranks all the way to its upper echelons. After being granted freedom by her third slave owner (a wealthy diamond mine owner and governor) Chica pursued a relationship with him which lasted several years and resulted in 13 children. Though they never officially married and the relationship was rife with scandal amongst the white Brazilian bourgeoisie, Chica had secured her financial freedom. She soon became the independent owner of a luxuriously adorned mansion - an anomaly for any 17th century colonial woman, let alone a former slave. Chica’s successful bid for freedom and strategic courting of one of Brazil’s wealthiest men ensured her ability to financially provide for herself and her family. Several of her children even went on to attain noble rankings. Though Chica undoubtedly benefited from certain nefarious aspects of colonial Brazilian society (eventually owning slaves herself), her legacy helped lessen the stigma surrounding formerly enslaved people as well as biracial people, of whom comprise the majority of contemporary Brazilian citizens. Today,

Last on our list is Mah Laqa Bai - famed 18th century poet, philanthropist and courtesan. Born in the princely state of Hyderabad, India - courtesans were elite women who were not only talented in music, dancing and literature but consorted closely with nobility and exercised considerable cultural and political influence. Born into a family of courtesans, Mah Laqa Bai received a privileged education by virtue of close noble ties. She excelled in the skills of horse riding and archery and was selected to accompany the Hyderabad nobility during three wars. However, her true passion lay in literature, becoming the first female poet to publish a complete Diwan, or collection of poems in Urdu. The title of Mah Laqa Bai was bestowed upon her by the ruler of Hyderabad, meaning “Visage of the moon”.

He also appointed her to the status of Omarah meaning ‘of the highest nobility’. During her lifetime, Mah Laqa Bai established a school for girls in the training of the arts, funded the opening of a public library and attained such vast wealth that she bequeathed multiple properties and fine jewellery to homeless women in her will. The impact of British colonialism greatly tarnished the reputations of revered and multitalented courtesans in India, thus her legacy of literature is not as widely known nor appreciated worldwide as it rightly should be. Locally, an ornate memorial is dedicated in her honour in her home city of Hyderabad.

“IT I S OF CR I T I CA L I M P O RTA N C E T HAT FEM I NI ST S D O N O T FA L S E LY E QUAT E SEXUALI T Y W I T H MO RA LI T Y.” Turning our attention briefly to sex work within the modern era, it is of critical importance that us feminists do not falsely equate sexuality with morality. The autonomy attained by courtesans of the old world was indeed never truly independent of men, having to perform for the male gaze and relying on them for patronage. Sex work critics would argue the same is true in the 21st century and therefore grounds for criminalisation. However, solely critiquing the patriarchal hegemony to the exclusion of all other exploitive class structures fails to take into account the numerous potential intersections of oppression faced by sex workers. Outlaw sex work and workers who are trans, people of colour, disabled or of low socio economic background are still at the mercy of colonial powers, patriarchal authority and the wealthy elite - all of which are inextricably connected and upheld by the subordination of those less privileged. Complete decriminalisation is the only just way forward as the rights of all women and marginalised folk are inseparably bound with the freedom of sex workers. It is worth noting that the only decriminalised sex industries are found in NSW and New Zealand, and subsequently provide the highest level of safety and rights for sex workers in the world. If intersectional feminism is to succeed in the emancipation of marginalised people worldwide, it is not merely the patriarchy that must be dismantled but the myriad of structural barriers that seek to disempower the masses. The autonomy of sex workers are inherently intertwined within this global struggle and therefore must assume their rightful positions - in the revolution.

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MOVING BEYOND CONSENT

A Marxist Feminist Manifesto on Alleviating Sexual Violence and The Fight for Better Sex. The #metoo movement has brought the topic of sexual violence within our institutions and communities to the forefront of public conversation. Survivors have taken to varying forms of media from personal social media accounts to the corporate mainstream media, sharing their stories and shining a light on the sexual abuse they’ve experienced, and the deliberate concealment of their stories by those more powerful than them. The conversation around sexual violence is a necessary one, and I believe the #metoo movement to be well intentioned, but it is one that has so far lacked a radical politics, failing to adequately address how to tangibly alleviate sexual violence within our communities. Various often repeated mantras such as ‘yes means yes’, ‘no means no’ and ‘consent is sexy’ fail to offer a genuine and emancipatory approach to quelling intimate gendered and sexual violence. Indeed, they offer a superficial quick-fix non-solution, which fails to prick below the surface and interrogate the very nature of sex and sexual violence in our society. Ultimately, what is currently the normative or hegemonic model pertaining to sex, the consent model, is not the answer when it comes to both eradicating sexual violence in our spaces or the vision of a better, more pleasurable sex for everyone.

I. CONSENT AS LIBERALISM Consent is a legal concept derived from liberal contract theory, and at it’s legal root is not a reciprocal term or concept, but rather is concerned with one person allowing another person to do something to them, whether that entails saying yes or saying no. Classic consent theory is applicable to acts which are unpleasant, dangerous or unsafe, with it’s classical legal function being to make something that would otherwise be harmful or illegal into something okay, like injecting a needle with toxic ink into somebody, or what is more commonly known as tattooing. The idea that the legal system should be our arbiter of sex and sexual violence too, is in and of itself problematic, with courts as patriarchal bodies operating under sexist stereotypes. Moreover, as Marxist feminists we should advocate for a sexual violence framework that seeks to abolish prisons, opposing the criminal justice system. The legal system is an institution that contributes to an unjust world via reproducing the gendered power dynamics that contribute to sexual violence. We need to reject the turn to the state, which advocates for increased incarceration. As Marxists, and as feminists, our politics cannot be tied to one that is carceral in nature.

The recent shift from the idea of ‘no means no’ to ‘yes means yes’ does not actually mark a fundamental shift within the politics of consent.

Functionally, there is no reason that the same social pressures that would lead me in a sexual situation not to say no, are not going to be the same social pressures that would lead me in a sexual situation to say yes.

Indeed, I, and many of my female friends (on top of more overt instances of sexual assault) have said yes to have sex we didn’t really want to have, out of a perceived obligation. Further, the recent trend from pop media sites comparing consent to wanting and drinking tea is as dubious as it is dangerous. I’ve said yes to tea many times that I didn’t want to drink, and I’ve accepted mugs of milk, when I can’t stand the taste, struggling to fake a smile in between gulps, drinking out of politeness. This model does not address, let alone eradicate, power in sexual relationships.

Moreover, the marketisation of consent is also reflected in our modern era, with the introduction of numerous apps and online contracts where sexually active people can download and sign on the touch screen line, before they engage in sexual encounters. Our vision of a better sexuality cannot be one that is modeled on market or contractual logic.

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II. CONSENT REINFORCING PATRIARCHAL SOCIAL RELATIONS AND HETERONORMATIVITY.

III. THE FAILURE OF THE CONSENT MODEL & FIGHT FOR BETTER SEX.

The contractual idea of sex is indeed neoliberal in nature, seeing individuals as atomistic units, which operate solely in their self-interest, separate from a society that socially conditions us to act in a certain way. In what interpersonal communication do we, especially as women, know exactly what we want, say exactly what we want, and express ourselves with confidence – why would sex be any different?

Many might agree with critiques of consent, however, presumably a significant amount of support for the model stems from a noticeable lack of alternatives in alleviating sexual violence and promoting a culture of better sex. It seems as if many have given up.

Believing that consent is the superior model for sexual politics, and it is the best approach that we can hope and advocate for. Certainly these arguments are at least in part premised on the idea that to critique or confront consent as a model for sexual politics will indeed challenge one of our only existing strategies for opposing problematic sexual behaviour.

Slogans such as ‘no means no’ and ‘yes means yes’, and indeed the consent model more broadly do, I think, come from a well intentioned place.

However, practically they serve to reinforce moments in which we, as women, grant permission to men using our bodies for their own sexual gratification. Our sexual pleasure is divorced from any framework other than us merely, consenting.

As such, working within this dominant framework of sex, we, as women are simultaneously expected to not enjoy ourselves during sex, and yet, our very enjoyment of sex hinges on consent.

The current preoccupation with the consent model functionally denies the opportunity to contest the biggest problem with sex in its current framework as something that a man (active) wants and something that a woman (passive) accepts or consents to. As such, our role within the sexual sphere as articulated via the consent model is to act as being the ‘gatekeeper’ to male sexual desire, and ultimately, the path to male ejaculation. Is this not a practice which reinforces a culture of sexual violence or rape culture, where male sexual entitlement is contingent on us, as women? Is this not a model which further entrenches patriarchy and heteronormativity, rather than one that dissolves power relations?

Recently, there has been an upsurge in support for the model of ‘enthusiastic consent’, a sexual ethics premised on asking for a ‘yes’ before engaging in any form of sexual activity. However, the model still sees consent as given, and superficially tinkers with existing problems, rather than confronting them. Indeed, it still offers us a liberal illusion of freedom in contractual relations, arguing that a verbal contract between individuals in regards to sex constitutes a mutual agreement or free exchange, whilst dismissing the power differences between men and women and how we interact with one another on an interpersonal level.

But, we cannot let the fear blind us. Ultimately, our current model has not on both a cultural or legal level worked in alleviating situations of unwanted sex, nor has it benefitted survivors. Operating as a contractual and legal arrangement, consent is something that is retroactively applied to sexual encounters, at the expense of what survivors say.

Consent does not offer us what it promises us, and our refusal to come to terms with that only impinges progress in the field of sexual politics.

At it’s heart, the issue of sexual violence is a political one. It is concretely weaved into histories of gendered power, heteronormativity and the regulation and suppression of human sexual behaviour. Accordingly, any solution to the problem of sexual violence needs to be a political one which addresses power. It is crucial to acknowledge that the option is not consent or nothing, or consent or risk, but rather what we are presented with is the choice between quasi-simple liberal ‘solutions’ and an emancipatory, radical political project that aims to target the root causes of sexual violence in our world. These issues stem from capitalist-patriarchy, which as a system dictates the uneven dissemination of power along gendered lines in every area of life.

Prevailing gender norms, heterosexuality and the false binary that views our public and private lives as separate all need to be dissolved. The idea that all we can aspire to is ‘consensual’ sex is one that we, as feminists should wholeheartedly reject.

We should advocate for a sex that is wanted and gratifying, and not merely something we tick a box to. It is only by challenging consent that we can begin to consider a radical sexual vision that is premised on pleasure and joy.

Words: Lara Sonnenschein

“WE SHOULD ADVO CATE FOR A SEX THAT IS WANTED AND GRATIFYING, AND NOT MERELY SOMETHING WE TICK A BOX TO.” 013

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My first encounter with the word sex came when I was six; someone in my year decided to write it on a desk.

The biggest scandal of course was not the word itself but the writing on the desk, however, I remember wondering about what the word meant and as a curious child I asked; from what I could tell it was how babies came to be. When I asked my Mum for more information (with the hope she could explain more) the response, I got was far from positive; I was told it was a bad word and not to be discussed. From her perspective I can only imagine how difficult it would be to talk about such a taboo issue to anyone, let alone to a child. So understandably it was brushed under the rug.

As years went on, I was taught at my Catholic school that sex occurs between a man and a woman who are married and loved each other. This wasn’t something I questioned for a long time, nor did I question the concept of losing your virginity before marriage - which for a woman is consider a cardinal sin (God forbid a woman has her own sexual needs).

However, as I reached high school, I began to question this and eventually reached the conclusion that first, sex can be between any two people, second, that it can happen before marriage and third, that sex was just a physical act with the potential consequence of an unplanned pregnancy. This began to resonate with me more and more in my rebellious teen years as the discussion of sex was approached in PDHPE. It was year 10 at an all-girls Catholic school and it was perhaps the highlight of the year for us; a topic this controversial to be discussed openly - who would have thought!?

HIGH S CHO OL SEX ED F*CKI NG SUCK S

The discussion focused around the concept of abstention as the underlying message; the teachers were in no way encouraging us to have sex (Catholic School Official Policy). In fact from the look on their faces most of them condemned it. The second part came from the If clause; IF you do have sex these are the contraceptive measures available and the facts about contracting STIs. This took place in one hour, a combined four classes and three very uncomfortable teachers. That was it, I was set, I knew all the practical and preventative measures. Or so I thought.

Nothing prepared me for understanding how much more there is to sex. The disjuncture between how I thought I was supposed to feel after having sex compared to what I did feel did not make sense. In my mind I’d had sex, I had been careful and I wasn’t pregnant nor did I have any STDs. From what I knew I was doing everything right.

It wasn’t until my fourth one-night stand did I realise that something wasn’t quite right. I had never felt comfortable exploring myself sexually; I’ve slept with eight guys and managed to get them off but never

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THE CONCEPT OF SEX REMAINS INHERENTLY TAUGHT IN A WAY THAT NEGLECTS WOMEN’S NEEDS.

masturbated. I’ve never watched porn despite having expressed certain ‘fantasies’ to guys. I’ve only recently started to understand that there is so much more to sex and my sexual experiences than being physically ‘safe’.

Being safe is a huge aspect but that safety isn’t just practical, its an emotional and mental safety that is so rarely discussed, particularly for women. For women, being sexually aware of yourself, being able to understand your body’s points of sexual pleasure and understanding your own boundaries in regards to sex, can really help you when having sex with any partner. It is a vital aspect of anyone’s sexual health and yet it is continually ignored.

I am still struggling to change how I see sex; I still go through the basic cause and effect- I’ve had ‘safe’ sex and have prevented unwanted pregnancy and STDs. But I know that I have so much more to do in being sexually healthy; knowing my own body, needs and boundaries. I want to feel empowered about my body and needs when I have sex, and more importantly I want every woman to be able to feel the same.

Sexual education in Australia is appalling, the focus remains solely on contraceptives, STIs and in my particular experience, abstinence. This needs to change, particularly for young women. They need to be educated on their sexual health and empowered to have sex in a way that meets their needs. They need to be told that masturbation isn’t a dirty word or something women do not do.

The concept of sex remains inherently taught in a way that neglects women’s needs. Once again women are left unconsidered and disregarded. It’s time the conversation changes from beyond the general checklist and opens up sexual health to include understanding one’s sexual needs. It’s time women are taught to find their voice in the bedroom.

Words: Anonymous

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rituals Mavis Tian

i cry by moonlight bright clarion call ancestors can you hear me? cold chasing away the sweet embrace of spring i’m not crying it’s my allergies mosquitos steadily biting, humming their presence my unwitting audience to fears and secrets i long to spill but terror of tradition keeps me silent each bite an answer from beyond hope my pleas are heard pouring libations deep into earth desperate hope in every drop pretend alcoholism the next day, unable to admit by sunlight the need for ancestral connexion this is white man’s land and theirs is no-man’s land step too far too visible end up shot sorry it took so long i can’t talk normally to you, only in stolen moments on old western Holidays. even this is dictated by white man’s history i’m sorry what else can i do?

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You treat this body like a boat A final resting place for all of your baggage I am sinking Singing songs of resistance at the bottom of a sea Where no one will hear me I will swim with sirens until I die Women of the sea, demonised for seducing men To a rocky drowning death Fingers of blame following me beneath the waves Will I finally rest In the absence of words I pray For a back that can bear the burden of everything If only I could be everything In the meantime I will be singing songs of resistance at the bottom of a sea, Where no one will hear me III. May this music be a testimony A promise That in the absence of words we will sing ballads into empty oceans Let melodies of truth seep out of our slit necks Watch while we set patriarchies’ pain on fire I hope you choke on the smoke We are more than the men who made us small We are more than the men who hurt us They are silence We are sound Genesis is synonymous with us And symphonies accompanied our birth Lady of the lake I rise from the depths When I shake my hair Daggers fall out 017

CRESCENDO

II. But my spine is scattering Stretching out to the heavens in an exodus of my exhaustion Fatigue is my only virtue I am drained of words in a way only a cloud after a hurricane would understand Each time I lift my shirt there are new scars Holding the weight of hurt women on this skin My throat is heavy with truths Clinging to this reluctant anchor of a mouth That is tired of being asked questions As if I am a vending machine for answers You insist God is a man, ask him

by Amani Mahmoud

I. I learnt the language of resistance from the silence of a woman In the absence of her words I built sanctuaries A kingdom where her hymns echo Filling voids But there are no sonnets of melancholic mourning here Only choruses celebrating her glory Choirs of defiance And even though hands that never healed built this spine from shards of glass An orchestra of woman built me And our harmonies will grace ears that will combust upon our crescendo

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EXIT SIGNS

BY DONNALYN XU

In the blue hours of my hometown, I listen to the conversations of men.

Flesh-coloured, flower-beaten, I go gentle.

I braid my own hair, retrace the lines around what makes me woman.

The white man on the street tells me I am pretty like a China doll. Mixed blood, but still sweet milk & jasmine. Still small enough to swallow. Half-dreaming of my mother’s island, I watch my own tender solitude as a father reads to his only son & teenage boys walk with their arms around each other’s waists, the angel cusp of their cradled bodies slowly growing. How they touch each other only as men do. How I carry the weight, pretend I do not know the danger of hands.

I follow the rage through the window of a burning building & try to remember myself through fragments. I walk through the halls of my body like it is a museum of lost things. & even in dreams, even in death, I count all the closest exits.

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BLACK ANGELS DO EXIST

BY KIKI AMBERBER yesterday I called you an angel and you smiled in bitter air it cuts tongues in half, so I cannot say my name, so I am named instead by such loud words, see: here I stand, that violent tragic ghost they warned you of. didn’t you know that a black person living is invisible?

I breathe my own corporeality out hard through my nose, it is cold tell me how to hold myself and all this death too my skin is gravel made smooth up close the specks dance off a bridge again and again remind me, how many black bodies make a black person? in drier air my name spills so strong out of mouths that know it means ‘saint’

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SPEAKING TO THE CITY WHERE SHE WALKED Hello Cuenca!

How are you?

What news, what gossip have you? !Verito! !Mija! !A los años!

We are two days short of June, of the year 1963.

Your grandmother, Maria Eugenia Mora, has just become a mother for the first time, and to a son, a warm- hearted rebel, your father.

As you know, stories are often passed on as half-truths. Plots, characters and climaxes are often transformed by the eccentricity of their storyteller. With this in mind, I shall continue with this story, my version, decorated with the quirks and inaccuracies that are often preceded by ‘according to my memory, what happened is this…’

Go on Cuenca, do go on.

Your grandmother was a beautiful woman. It is such a shame you never had the opportunity to meet her. She was so young too, only 29! Who knows what else life had in store for her.

I know Cuenca. I know. That is why I am here, to know her better. To match the many stories, I know of her from my mother and father with the essence of your city, the place wherein she was born and lived with my father until her death. I am here, in your city, to enquire about her. By insisting that you and others tell me what she was like, I hope to able to go back in time, to imagine and somehow connect with her.

I can tell you that when she walked on my streets, I danced to the rhythm of her heels against the cobblestones. I watched her straighten her coat. I envied the rubies and pearls that found a home on her olive skin. She was an earth-bound goddess in an opulent disguise.

When your father arrived, everyone need not know he was her son. He was her mirror and wishing well, the place wherein she invested her all, her love and hope. When he inherited her kingdom, the earth mourned her death and the heavens celebrated her

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return. Your father, a thirteen-year-old boy at the time, a misguided demigod, a motherless son, felt abandoned and soon forgot how to dream. Without the nurture of his mother god, without her wisdom and guidance, your father soon became a fallen hero and an unlikely prince.

He was often seen roaming alone for hours and without direction. Shady characters often tempted him. One day, he surrendered his innocence. On another, he exchanged his immortality for a life in darkness. And by the account of his numbered, human days, he forgot who he was.

Aggrieved by a society ill-matched for her son, your grandmother resigned from her kingdom in the heavens and returned to earth to watch over her earth-bound prince.

Trapped by the curse of her early death, she couldn’t take on her human form again.

She returned instead as the two most important markers of his existence: his thoughts and actions. Her guardianship in this form was unknown to him, its subtlety had been disguised by the coded coincidences through which she made herself present.

One such coincidence was that your mother, your father’s wife, would share her name.

Another that, her son, your father, would bear the daughters she never had. And yet another, that your sister and you would be her image and therefore his wishing well – his opportunity to dream again.

Now that you have returned, her presence has been recently felt and talked about. The keepers of her kingdom and the citizens which loved her, have already celebrated her return in the form of yourself and your sister.

Every now and then, you may feel her presence in the sentiments of those she left behind.

You may see her in the family which bears her name, and who will always volunteer their eyes to enable her to witness the rebirth of her son in the smile and tears of her granddaughters.

So dear daughter of an ancient land and bearer of an ancient and great name, be soothed, calmed and revived by your story. As the keeper of your history, I encourage you to remain curious, and implore you to never forget me.

Forget? Never!

In order to entice your return, I must reserve the next chapter for another day.

Can I not be told now?

You will be told soon. First, let these fragments of your story piece themselves together.

Let them become part of you.

Querida Cuenca, city of the spirits I love most, you are so wise. These tears will remind me that this story is now one I have lived. That here, you imagined with me, the days of a woman I loved even before I knew her. Querida Cuenca, you cannot be loved and thanked enough!

Words: Elizabeth Mora

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ROSA LU X E M B U R G “Rosa Luxemburg had an unshakeable faith in the ability for ordinary people to resist the system and fight back against their oppression, a vision she maintained until her death.”

Rosa Luxemburg was one of the greatest revolutionary socialists of her time, significantly contributing to the worker’s movement in Poland and Germany before she was murdered during the German Revolution in 1919. Luxemburg is still an important figure to remember a century later, as her lifelong commitment to international solidarity with the oppressed and her commitment to challenging the system is something for activists today to aspire towards.

Luxemburg was a disabled, Polish-Jewish woman living under Russian occupation, however, instead of accepting the oppression she faced, she threw herself into political activity from a young age. She joined the left-wing Polish Proletariat Party, and organised a general strike while she was still in school - this resulted in the execution of several party leaders, but it didn’t deter her from continuing to meet with the group in secret.

Wanting to be in the centre of the socialist movement, Luxemburg moved to Germany and joined the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the largest of its kind in the world at the time. She was critical to the formation of its uncompromising leftwing values, which focused on radical internationalism and revolutionary politics as a guide to liberate all workers and oppressed groups, including women and national minorities, not just Poles or Germans. Luxemburg was an incredible intellectual and theoretician of the SPD, whose works are still held in high esteem by the modern left. Her comrade, Max Adler, described her as: “An untamed revolutionary force was alive in this frail little woman. It was characteristic of her, however, that her intellect never lost control of her temperament, so that the revolutionary fire with which she always spoke was also mingled with coolheaded reflectiveness, and the effect of this fire was not destructive but warming and illuminating.”

The contributions Luxemburg made to the women’s liberation movement are invaluable, offering sharp analysis of the systematic place of sexism within capitalism, and providing insight into how to fight back agaisnt this system. She said at a rally in 1912, “Women’s suffrage is the goal. But the mass movement to bring it about is not a job for women alone but is a common class concern for women and men of the proletariat. Germany’s present lack of rights for women is only one link in the chain of the reaction that shackles the people’s lives.” Here, she remains uncompromising in her commitment for universal emancipation, striving for nothing less than liberation for all the oppressed. For Luxemburg, the fight against sexism could not be separated from the fight against the system - women’s oppression was a result of capitalism, and as such, required the whole of the working class, men and women alike, to struggle collectively.

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One of Luxemburg’s greatest legacies was her staunch opposition to the First World War. At the time, the commonsense attitude was to support the war, even amongst the radical left and the majority of the working class. The SPD was one of many pro-war social democratic parties at the time due to their position within the German state, meaning that in order to retain parliamentary influence, they had to support World War 1. She was one of the most prominent members of the SPD who voiced anti-war opposition against the party line, remaining committed to her principles, so much so that she left the SPD and founded the Spartacus League as an anti-war alternative. For her anti-war activities, she was imprisoned in 1916, however, she would continue to write articles opposing the war, which had to be smuggled out by friends.

Luxemburg was only freed from prison when the German Revolution broke out in in November 1918, a mass revolt of the working class that was inspired by the Russian Revolution a year earlier. However, she did not experience much of it - the German state, now under the control of the SPD, did not want the worker’s revolution from posing a challenge to the existing order. As a clear, revolutionary leader, Luxemburg was murdered in early 1919 by the freikorps, right-wing paramilitary units sent by the SPD government with the goal of destroying the revolution. This was not accidental, but a specific order given - the murder of such a prominent figure was a concerted tactic to undermine the strategy and cohesion of the revolution. However, her death was not met passively, as the German Revolution saw renewed combativity and vivacity in the working class in retaliation. Workers recognised the crucial role that Luxemburg played and, as she had done throughout her life, refused to stay subordinated to an oppressive system.

Rosa Luxemburg had an unshakeable faith in the ability for ordinary people to resist the system and fight back against their oppression, a vision she maintained until her death. The night before she died, she wrote: “Your “order” is built on sand. Tomorrow the revolution will rise up again, clashing its weapons, and to your horror it will proclaim with trumpets blazing: I was, I am, I shall be!” Luxemburg knew that the potential for total social change lay, not within the parliament, but with the masses of working people, uniting together in struggle.

Words: Sophie Haslam

“The night before she died, she wrote: “Your “order” is built on sand. Tomorrow the revolution will rise up again, clashing its weapons, and to your horror it will proclaim with trumpets blazing: I was, I am, I shall be!” Luxemburg knew that the potential for total social change lay, not with the parliament, but with the masses of working people, uniting together in struggle.”

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HOROSCOPE FOR LOST SOULS

by Donnalyn Xu birth of the new season begins like a day with no edges. first month in winter, always tender to the touch. mercury is no longer in retrograde, so this week will be a good one. but you are waiting for a sign – thunder or silence, thunder or silence – is the hunger synonymous with love? is it a thirst for the world, or a heart ruled by venus? the answer is both or neither so you watch old episodes of oprah until you find out. to heal yourself: buy a cheap dress and invest in some expensive chocolate. write your own name into a poem. say it is a mantra. say it is a homecoming. say the skin still grows back, even if it stings. when you look outside, the broken light on the pavement is not as beautiful as it should be. but you forgive it, anyway. june is only just beginning, and you have always been good at making art out of rust.

ARTWORK; RANUKA TANDAN

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Bi

tch

We need to talk about how language is used and constructed around women within the patriarchy, notably that of the word “bitching”. Bitching usually refers to women talking about another woman or friend behind their back, in a negative or derogatory way.

Of course, within our society girl on girl hate and competition is encouraged, ones sexuality is always up for intense scrutiny and putting others down for temporary boosts of self esteem is common, especially online. However, it is the over use and abuse of this word to describe women’s actions that lead me, as a young 19 year old feminist, to distance myself from talking about any woman behind her back, out of respect for that woman and out of refusal to partake in what was often a sexist and unfair narrative. My refusing to partake, and brushing off of any negative talk about other women also meant, back when I was 19, that I failed to listen and support my co worker and friend when she tried to talk to me about our other colleagues bullying, manipulation and intimidation of us. This other colleague was a toxic friend. She was nice to us sometimes, lifted us up sometimes and we were always trying to please her and strive to be her friend. But she would constantly spread rumours and lies, would snap at us, belittle us, and would often give us no option but to put up with incredibly unfair behaviour and standards that left us feeling unsafe, anxious, confused and mostly like crap. I only started listening to this other friend when I found myself being persecuted by the bully, and I realised that all the signs had been there from the start, but I had refused to listen to that niggling voice in the back of my mind. But that wasn’t the only voice I hadn’t listened to, as I hadn’t listened to my friend telling me her concerns about this toxic friend, as I immediately brushed off any talk behind a girls back as “bitching” and therefore inherently unfair and sexist in nature.

in

g?

To refer to any “behind the back talk” as bitching is unfair due to the fact that it dismisses any woman’s, or any persons, concerns or uncertainties about a friend as petty and out of spite, when in reality we often seek consoling, reassurance or clarity out of a confusing situation or friendship. Our first thought shouldn’t be presuming that this woman is overreacting or being mean, our first thought should be to take her words seriously. To downplay such interactions as bitching also presumes that women are unable to separate their concerns about the friendship to internalised sexism, and waters down potentially serious issues to nothing more than idle gossip, not giving women the benefit of the doubt that they are capable of distinguishing the two. However that does not mean that the aforementioned “bitching” doesn’t exist. It can often be used as a means to avoid confrontation and communication out of fear, and to create a hierarchy or power structure within a small friendship group or larger work environment. But maybe it’s time to start referring to that behaviour for what it is, as bullying or as internalised sexism, rather than the strongly gendered word “bitching”, and in turn start referring to those looking for a conversation or advice with a friend on a complex situation or toxic friendship as consoling one another.

It is important we deconstruct the use of our language around women because this in turn can influence how we speak and interact with one another, and how we chose to filter or not filter ourselves. I still constantly censor myself and my thoughts out of fear that my niggling thoughts are overreactions or unfair, never letting myself dwell on the thought that sometimes the person that I am friends with is actually toxic, and that’s why we need to rephrase our language. Because we need to let ourselves feel comfortable with consoling each other or raising our concerns or confusion without the fear of judgement that we are nothing more than gossipy bitches. We owe women the respect that anything they say behind the back of another woman hasn’t already been thoroughly scrutinised and picked over through our own, internalised sexist anxieties that deep down we’re being petty or bitchy. Because the gendered and unfair use of the word “bitching” has lead women to gaslight themselves, censor themselves and avoid utilising friendships for what they are there for, out of fear that the only label this interaction could have is that of “bitching”.

Words: Harriet Jane

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AN INTERGENERATIONAL AND INTERSECTIONAL PERSPECTIVE ON MENTAL HEALTH WORDS: LAYLA MKH ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN HONI SOIT According to the Australian Medical Association, many Australians will experience a mental illness at some point in their lives, and almost every Australian will see the effects of mental illness manifest in a family member, friend or work colleague. A quick scroll down Facebook pages like USyd Rants reveals a large amount of anonymous posts on depression, anxiety and attention disorders, all at varying severities and within different contexts. As a university student who has been diagnosed with a severe anxiety and panic disorder, these posts are all too familiar and relatable.

My first experiences with mental illness are not my own. To be an Arab woman in this country is to know heartbreak, hazn (sadness) and depression like a second language you will never unlearn. It is from the generations of women who have come before me, whose lives have been continuously harmed by patriarchy and whiteness, that I have learnt what survival means. I have learnt that, despite different historical contexts, our experiences will always be similar, bound together by the resilience we have to learn from the pain we are forced to experience.

To be an Arab woman is to know that mental wellbeing and illness do not exist in isolation. The two are inextricably linked to traumatic experiences relating to patriarchy and whiteness. These experiences are embedded into the lives of all Arab women who battle between being foreigners in the West and restricted in the East. We battle between finding comfort in a culture that confines them and breaking free from the chains that they don’t often know they have. As a result, it is impossible to have even a slight understanding of mental health issues among Arab women unless an intersectional and intergenerational lens is used.

1949 It is the year after the Nakba. A woman named Inaam is born in August as the summer sun rises to kiss the horizons of a newly independent Lebanon. Just under eight years have passed since its liberation from French colonialism. My grandmother is one of eight children born to a poor family in a tiny coastal village north of Trablos, named Deir Ammar.

My grandmother, my Tayta, is a tiny, quiet and poised woman. She is infinitely proud, defiant and the definition of resilient. She has raised seven kids in a foreign country, and had to bury one of them just before she turned 26. My mother is her oldest daughter. She once told me that my Tayta said that she had never felt true happiness in her time living after losing her son Hassan.

In the year 1976, my Tayta, my Jedo and their kids came to Australia. My Jedo swears on his life that they came on a vacation to take a break from the war, but 43 years on and he has only ever gone back for six short stays. Tayta says that there is nothing left for her in Lebnan anymore. Her parents have long since passed away and she now struggles to find a feeling of home in the land that she was born in; in the land that she had to bury her first son.

I know only a little of the pain my Tayta has had to deal with. In her 43 years here, she has never learnt English. Her limited vocabulary extends to what she learns from my sisters and I. Words like “hectic” and “wow” are sometimes incorporated into her conversations with us, but it never extends beyond that. Despite this, she is one of the most intelligent women I know. Born one of ten siblings, seven of whom were girls, my Tayta was also one of the few in her family who did not go to school. A mixture of poverty and patriarchy were the reasonings, with my great grandfather often jokingly boasting that she did not need to go to school. “For what?” he would say. “So she can write letters to all her lovers?”

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write in English or Arabic. She says this with a heavy weight in her voice – it’s obvious that it is not only her love for learning that inspires this feeling, but also a mixture of terrible experiences.

To be an Arab woman is to be socialised to want to marry from the moment you recognise that boys are boys. To be an Arab woman is to think of planning our lives around children who do not even exist – before even thinking of our careers, our education or our futures. Children are blessings, and the Arabic word for womb is rahm, with a root meaning of ‘mercy’. It is in this mercy and the loss of these blessings that some of my Tayta’s worst pain has been felt. On her belly are several large scars. The marks are still criss-crossed on her skin from one end of her rib cage to another. Some of the marks are testaments to the children that she has lost. My Mama says that Tayta has had 14 miscarriages and counts seven as somewhat traumatic. It is in these losses that Tayta wishes the most that she knew how to speak English.

Of all the losses she’s had, from her first son when he was seven years old, to one of her younger sisters, the most chilling is her recollection of her first hospital experiences in Australia. Tayta often jokes about how when she first arrived, she learnt the hard way that concentrated cordial needed to be broken down with water, and that dog food was indeed not food for humans. But it was her descriptions of her experiences at Bankstown Hospital which surprised me. I was only 14 years old when my Tayta told me that she had lost a child that she almost carried to term. She never got to see what he looked like. She vividly remembers trying to mime to the white nurses that she wanted to see her baby only once. That she wanted to hold the baby, skin on skin in her arms, just one time before he was buried. Her requests were misunderstood, refused, confused — whatever you want to call it. Not only was she denied her child — her mercy — she was denied a moment to see her blessing before he joined his oldest brother Hassan in Jannah.

Some would argue that there is no literal Arabic translation for the word “depression.” The Arabic word most adjacent to the word depression translates to “sorrow.” When she talks about health, my Tayta says that a lot of these “mental illnesses” are new. That, “back in the day,” there was no such thing. But there are moments when I see my Tayta force a smile, or a laugh that never quite reaches her eyes — and I understand that she has never felt true happiness. It is definitely sorrow, but it is also so much more.

1972 Born the oldest girl, Mama knows tough skin like no other. Between being a translator for her migrant parents, and helping Tayta raise her baby brothers and sisters, Mama has had the experience of mothering to last a lifetime. Born in Bhanine in a tiny house in the middle of a farming town, my Mama arrived in Sydney with a single word of English on her lips. Her name is Kadije, like Khadija, the Prophet’s ‫ ﷺ‬first wife. She once told me that in high school some students nicknamed her “cabbage” because they couldn’t pronounce her name. She laughs it off, says it was normal at the time, but can now acknowledge that those students were probably racist.

In the early 1990s my mother was an accomplished fashion designer, working hard to become an assistant at Supré and living the life she dreamt of. She was successful, came from a well respected family and was a hard worker. Men all around flocked at the family home one by one, asking for permission to “get to know” my mother, all with the end goal of marrying her. She never really gave many men time of day until she went to visit Lebnan.

Calling him the handsome boy next door, Mama always reminds me that she should’ve paid more attention to many of the ways my father made her miserable before she even married him. When you are taught that you exist only in relation to men, it is often difficult to not make excuses, to not ignore all the fuckups, to not shrug off everything as a “mistake.” My Mama often tells me that in her childhood, both boys and girls were raised the same, but I often wonder whether this is completely true. I have seen both my aunty — my Khalto — and my Mama marry young, abandoning careers and education for children. I know that deep down, no matter how much interpersonal education passes between generations of women, these practices are embedded within culture.

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My mother doesn’t speak much about my father anymore. When my sisters and I were younger, her commentary about him ranged from sadness, to anger, and then to downright despair. My mother is still recovering from the long term trauma inflicted upon her, even over 15 years after their divorce. In the eight years they were married, my mother cannot recollect a single moment where he put a smile on her face.

A study undertaken by the Australian Institute for Health and Welfare found that intimate partner violence has one of the most serious impacts on women’s health. In 2011 alone, it contributed to more burden of disease (the impact of illness, disability and premature death) than any other risk factor for women aged 25 to 44. Among these, mental health conditions were the largest contributor to the burden due to physical/sexual intimate partner violence, with anxiety disorders making up the greatest proportion (35%), followed by depressive disorders (32%). Dealing with emotional, financial and physical abuse, alongside cheating, I still know that my Mama was one of the lucky ones.

Mama has thanked God many times for the fact that she has only given birth to girls. My father was the oldest of his family, and, in a twisted and old cultural practice, wished that every single one of us were boys. For my Mama, this meant more abuse targeted at another element of her life that was out of anyone’s control. She gave birth with only my Tayta as support.

Many times during my childhood, I knew my mother, though extraordinary in many ways, continued to battle demons long after her divorce. Years after she had resigned from fashion designing, she studied social work. Though the profession is rigorously focused on wellbeing and coping, I still see the struggle. I still see the post-traumatic stress with which she is forced to navigate the world. I still see the scars that my father and the patriarchy have left on her.

1998 I was born the second of three girls to a passionately Lebnani family in the suburb of Bankstown, and I am well aware of the fact that being born in this country affords me the utmost privilege. For that I will be forever grateful. However, despite this privilege, to be born in this violent settler-colonialist country as an Arab Muslim woman is also to be caught between two different forms of patriarchy: one that is rooted in whiteness, and one that is deeply entrenched in the culture that one has learnt by heart. It is to be told that, despite the so-called progressiveness of this country, my anxieties are absurd. That despite my depressions, I need to remain positive and grateful.

My Tayta and my Mama have endured pain too long and too deep to describe, and I will never know the full extent to which they are still suffering. It is through their experiences that I am able to recognise that the long-term trauma of the Arab woman is intertwined in the registers of race, gender and class. It transcends as a physical and psychological memory. It is and is reinforced by culture and daily experiences of exclusion and domination. To mobilise against this is to recognise that my Mama, my Tayta and myself are just some of the few that exist in a collective state of depression around the world.

For us, it is something akin to feeling. These dark shadows that accompany our lives are embedded within our daily experience. From fleeing war, to losing children, to living in a violent settler-colonial islamophobic state, to being policed on our expressions — our experiences are intergenerational. They are not passed down but passed through, and all we have is each other. To be an Arab woman is to know sorrow like another language, but to live despite this. To exist is to resist, and to resist is to survive, and survival will only continue if we erase the problematic masculinities that are embedded within our culture.

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NO ONE IS BORN A PERFECT FEMINIST When I was 15, I hated myself for being too fat (I wasn’t, but that wasn’t the point). I had no friends at my new school, and I spent all of my time on the Internet looking for alternatives to my self-loathing. Fortunately, I had recently stumbled across the Bloggess, who makes a living turning her struggles with mental illness into comedy, and Amanda Palmer, an indie rock star who led an online campaign against body-shaming after her record company tried to fat-shame her. My love of these strong, powerful women, with their intensely different personalities pushed me towards feminism, which they both champion. I dove cheerfully into websites like Everyday Feminism, and tore voraciously through articles on fatness and body positivity, on PCOS and on the health-at-any-size movement. Reading the experiences of hundreds of women, the misogyny they experienced and the very real damage it caused them, left me outraged and shocked, and vowing that things needed to change.

When feminism told me I could fight that injustice, and also be beautiful despite thinking I was fat – I was sold.

Of course, I wasn’t yet questioning the assumption that beauty must be a woman’s end goal. I was a victim blamer and a slut-shamer. I was blindly ignorant of how much white privilege and class privilege I have, and generally, I was very naïve about how misogyny truly affects wom*n’s lives.

I was 17 when I realised that I was bi, and crushing on my best friend. She was straight, sadly, but at least she was a feminist too, and we made vague but unrealised plans about organising slutwalks despite neither of us having kissed anyone. I read a bit of Clementine Ford and thought she was making decent points, but being way too aggressive. I was too busy with school to be reading up on all the feminist theory that I had told myself I’d get around to, but I still managed to earn myself a reputation for ‘being one of those feminist chicks’, which meant that boys from school rolled their eyes at me if I pointed out that making rape jokes is, you know, maybe not funny.

But I wanted them to like me, so I always hurried to reassure them that I was a feminist, but only, like, within reason. The boys rewarded me for this by refusing to listen to any arguments I made about feminism.

I was no longer a slut-shamer, but I was still a victimblamer. I was pro-trans now, and angry about racism, but I still valued being liked over standing up for what I believed in. I still failed to realise how being a woman with any intersectional identity – be it

queerness, non-whiteness or a disability – intensifies the discrimination and suffering that wom*n must endure.

When I was 19, I was followed home by a strange man for the first time. I went to my first march (an anti-Trump protest) and experienced the euphoria of shouting out demands that I deeply believed in as part of a crowd of people who wanted real change. I learned about female and queer artists, writers and leaders that no one had ever bothered teaching me about before, and came to the obvious conclusion that women are amazing, and queer women generally even more so. I learned to listen the people who have first-hand experience in issues like sex work and trans rights rather than arbitrarily deciding that I know what’s better for people in different situations.

I still didn’t always speak up when I heard people being sexist, or racist, or homophobic. I did, often, but there were many instances when I was too scared of offending someone. I respected people’s pronouns, but I didn’t get the whole fuss about Australia Day. I hated capitalism and how it encourages prejudice, but I didn’t consider anything else to be a viable option.

Now that I am 21, I consider my words more. I have accepted socialism as the political ideology which most enables intersectional equality. I am comfortable in telling people that their words are not acceptable, and am no longer talking to people who persist in blatant racism, sexism and the like. I am trying hard to start conversations about the broken parts of our society, to encourage other people to attend rallies, to question their worldviews, and to not stand for mistreatment of anyone, ever. This is, often, not easy, but it is necessary. I am supported by so many wonderful women, and I am grateful to them all, for being role models, for introducing me to new perspectives and for forgiving my inevitable failings.

Right now, I don’t know what parts of my feminism or general worldview I will be looking back on with shame in two years, or in six. Doubtless, there will be changes. My feminism has always changed for the better as I’ve had new experiences, and more importantly, listened more to the experiences of others. Hopefully, it will only continue to improve.

Words: Klementine Burrell-Sander

"I AM T RY I N G HA RD T O S TA RT CO NVE R SAT I O N S A B OU T T HE BROK E N PART S O F OU R S O C I E T Y....

T H I S I S, OFT E N, N O T E A SY, BU T I T IS NE C E S SA RY." 029

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Through a constant stream of advertisements and the increased individualisation of mental health, neoliberalism has put a price on selfcare. When we think of self-care we think of bath bombs, of face masks and moisturiser – and these products promise us they will make us feel better, improve our lives and subsequently, tell us they will fix our problems. By addressing mental health in this way, we are ignoring the root cause of our problems; forsaking real mental health care and falling prey to the consumerism cycle which promises to sell us our mental health for a price.

Self-care is important and necessary, but in reality it shouldn’t look like what is being sold in magazines.

Self-care is dragging yourself to the GP to get a referral for counselling.

Self-care doing your washing before you run out of underwear. Self-care is forcing yourself to hang out with your friends when you feel like doing nothing but laying in bed, because sometimes tough love in necessary. Selfcare is relearning habits and hard work, it’s building healthy friendships and looking after your body – and it shouldn’t cost money.

NEOLIBERAL SELF CARE IS BULLSHIT This theme of the monetisation of (mostly women’s) mental health is a modern day representation of a historic problem – of ignoring and mistreating women’s mental health in dangerous ways. 100 years ago women were in psych wards for having postnatal depression, 50 years ago women were heavily medicated for depression caused by being forced to be a stay at home mom. The sterilisation and simplification of women’s mental health has been done to make it ‘easier’ to manage the ‘problem’ unhappy women cause in society. In trying to sell us back out mental health, packaged in skin care bottles, neoliberalism has created the ability to profit off mental illness through the free market. I argue that this is merely a distraction from the root cause of women’s misfortune; systematic oppression and a ruthless capitalist system.

Art and words: Jazzlyn Breen

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"Our feminism will be intersectional and anti-capitalist or it will be bullshit" USyd Women's Collective 2019

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