Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 10:46:47 -0500
From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood-AT-panix.com>
Subject: Re: M-TH: Re: Sexual liberation and male chauvinism


Mark Jones wrote:

>Well, we certainly don't become revolutionaries by proclaiming the
>virtues of capitalism to 3rd world women, as both you and Doug do.
>Insofar as these ARE your politics, they are not those of a
>revolutionary. And I find such views extraordinary among those
>who also loudly proclaim solidarity with the Zapatistas or 3rd world
>women.

Part of solidarity is listening to what the people you're "solidarizing
with" (an ugly phrase) say. And I'm just repeating what Zeynep said about
women in Turkey and Mexico, and what Debbie Nathan and Leslie Salzinger
said about Turkish women. Swasti Mitter has also studied Indian women in
London who say similar things. If you have evidence to the contrary, please
share it with us.

>> In that case, isn't that an example of how women's exclusion from paid
>> employment can and does have dire consequences?
>>
>It's more probably an example of what happens when you wreck
>health services, as has been done in Eastern Europe. But I repeat,
>the matter is that you (and Doug, and others) support capitalism's
>allegedly progressive mission in the peripheries, semi-colonies
>and other 'margins' whereas I (and others) have been concerned
>to show that what capitalism has done and is doing is to destroy viable
>cultures, irretrievably plunder and consign to oblivion the histories
>of entire peoples, and often the peoples themselves, and mercilessly
>and genocidally exploit whatever is left behind, above all women. This is
>why I am suspicious of people like Zeynep who, if Doug
>is to be believed, came back from Chiapas with little to report except that
>Zapatista men are sexist.

Of course I'm to be believed! Zeynep had lots to report, and I'm trying to
get her to write up her experiences in Chiapas. But what she said on this
specific matter is that despite professions of feminism by the Zap
leadership, actual women in Chiapas aren't allowed to speak for themselves
(except among themselves) - the men do all the talking in public. Again, if
you have evidence to the contrary, please share it with us.

Doug




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