Women Do Something (Continuing the conversation)

A couple of weeks ago I attended an event called Women Say Something and, naturally because I tell you guys almost everything, I blogged about it.  Thanks to that first event and the wonders of Facebook I am now hooked in to some super cool active women, the kind of women who get off their arses and make an event like this happen.  It seemed natural that I would go to the follow up event, after all it was free and I am broke, it's about feminist issues and I'm a feminist.  Best of all the event was attended by the fabulous Kimberly Dark.

Kimberly is a sociologist and a story teller.  She uses humour, irony and anecdote to open our eyes to the strange and interesting diversity of thought and perspective in our world.  I feel privileged to have had the opportunity to attend and to enjoy her work.

Me under the star with the star of the show, Kimberly Dark.

Lots of very interesting topics were raised and discussed by the group.  Many would be worthy of exploration and commentary.  The thing that resonated with me most intensely was the need to hold to our beliefs and represent our points of view every day in as many situations as we encounter.  One articulate young woman pointed out that thirty or forty years ago there was a huge gap in equality, it was blatant and gaping.  It was easy to see the cause, to know what was needed in the fight for Women's Liberation, for the Women's Movement, for Feminism.  So many things have changed and so many barriers have been broken down that it is more difficult than it was back then to simplistically categorize the target.  Yet inequity still exists in every arena.  As the young woman put it, "there are many small gaps rather than one large one".

I can't remember a time in my life when I did not believe that we influence the world one person at a time.  Mostly, on a day to day basis, I just try to make people smile in the hopes that they too will make someone else smile.  Long before that disgusting schmaltzy movie "Pay It Forward" claimed the high ground I believed in the difference small interactions can make.  As a lesbian I have always been "Out and Proud" in virtually every situation I have lived through.  This is how you combat homophobia.  You keep showing people that gay people are just normal everyday people like them, they/we are their friends, co-workers, family etc.  I don't think anyone has ever said this better than Hilary Clinton did recently at the Human Rights Day in Geneva, here courtesy of the Huffington Post is a transcript of her brilliant speech..  I digress...

Feminist is (as Girlwiththecane said in a comment on the last blog) still a dirty word..  But I don't really care what we call it (though it would be convenient to have a title that symbolically represented basically the same thing to everyone) but I do care about women and equality.  I believe we need to not shirk the day to day responsibility of having the courage of our convictions.  The courage to clearly state what we believe and why it matters to us.  I believe that we need to be Out and Proud as women and as feminists (regardless of the title).  We are 51% of the population, the world over, and we own less than 1% of the world's property.

Courtesy of Girl's Guide to Taking Over The World

This fight has not been won.  

This struggle is not over.  

This complacency is killing us.  

Every day in every interaction, we, the ordinary people not just the high profile organizers and activists, WE need to take this debate to our friends, our co-workers, and our families...

Stand up and be counted or stand down and be trodden on.

(As an aside some of the women were kicking on for a drink at my old stomping ground The Imperial but unfortunately I was starting to get that urge to be horizontal so I gave it a miss... maybe next time!)

People laughed in concentration camps

Freud, that old clever clogs, referred to laughter under adversity as "gallows humour" and in my family "black" humour is welcome and perhaps even expected.  When Mum was dying, an unbelievably devastating loss to me, we were still making jokes - We talked about renting a fishing boat so we could make her wish to be fed to the sharks come true... at the blackest moment after the doctor had left the room someone piped up "must be time to rent the boat".  That was her humour too, she would have been laughing right beside us if a persistent bleed in the brain hadn't been stealing her away.  When there is NO insecurity about how much you love someone, when everyone KNOWS and it is unquestionable, then everyone KNOWS that your heart is twisted in agony even though your wit is still snapping out quips and puns.

[WARNING SWEEPING GENERALIZATION TO FOLLOW]

I found, in my time in the US that  many American's take things a bit more seriously than Australians do.  Lots of my American friends have incredible senses of humour and make me laugh constantly, but the black humour thing... um... maybe not so much.  So to my American mates just know that I am not really a sick and twisted individual I'm just an Aussie embracing irreverence and upholding my national identity!  (A regular beer, an occasional meat pie, and a passionate love of the water covers most of the bases.)

Humour is a coping mechanism, a tool that helps us to escape for a moment, to release tension, to breathe more deeply and maybe to reset some of the mental roundabouts that our minds become caught upon.  I think that living with a condition like Fibromyalgia makes it very easy to fall into a trap of downwardly spiraling mental thought processes...  The name of my blog derives from just such an attempt to redirect mental processes into nonsense and silliness instead of gloom.

Nobody loves me

Everybody hates me

Think I'll go and eat worms

Big ones, small ones

Fat ones, thin ones

Worms that squiggle and squirm.

I'll (here the tempo increases) bite their heads off

Suck their guts out

Throw their skins away

Nobody knows how well I live on worms three times a day!

It's hard to explain to someone who doesn't have a chronic illness how you can be laughing and making jokes while still feeling like crap.  But this isn't a case of food poisoning that brings you down for a little while, it isn't something where you can permit yourself a couple of days of wallowing in self-pity knowing it will all be better by the weekend.  This condition is unrelenting and in spite of the pain and fatigue you still have to try to find ways to enjoy life and you must find ways to laugh.  Just today someone, whom I love, told me "it's not that bad", "you're okay".  I tried to explain how much I push myself for them, how much I hide the truth for them, how much I am at my very best when I am with them, and how much I pay later in private for those efforts.  More to the point I need to explain that I can't go on doing it.  That it's impossible to sustain a appearance of high energy and vitality now.  I want this person I love to know that when I feel joy and when I find things funny it doesn't mean that I'm not in pain.  You can't live your life in a morass of misery where your every thought is about how your body feels.  It would be far too easy to sink into a very dark place if you did.

So like the bloke on the way to be executed who when offered a cigarette quipped back "no thanks, I'm trying to quit", I'm going to keep trying to find things to laugh about.  It's Thursday and so tonight I am back to the Synagogue for another cooking lesson.  I'm resting up today so I can really pay close attention and have the stamina to make it through two hours.  

No silly, I'm not going to pay attention to the class, I'm going to pay attention to the people, and the ripely humourous moments that occur, so that I can remember them to tell you!

The Pessimistic Optimist Erupts

This little image appeared (originally from someone called Stevie Kidd) in my facebook feed today...

The accompanying text indicated that we need to take this step out of our comfort zones TODAY!

Well I looked at the diagram and considered my personal steps out of my comfort zone (that were MANY and varied) and how many of them actually landed in that enormous circle "where the magic happens" and I figured the diagram should look a little more like this...

I just listened to an interview on the radio with a woman called Barbara Ehrenreich who has written a book called Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America.  You can listen to the interesting interview here- http://www.kpbs.org/news/2009/dec/14/has-positive-thinking-undermined-america/

We have been completely swamped in the last few years by movements like "The Secret" and "Think and Grow Rich" and it makes me wonder if it has created a culture of ostrich-ism (no not ostracism though that is evident too).  It seems everyone was doing the ostrich thing while the mortgage industry collapsed into chaos.  Ms Ehrenreich suggests that it may have been viewed as negative if someone had said to their bank something like, "I'm concerned about our exposure to subprime mortages".

Could it be that this relentless dedication to positive thinking is really a way to tell people who have a problem to "Just shut up!"?  Is it the great ameliorate of all ills that it is purported to be or is it simply an unrealistic superficial way of chucking a Scarlet O'Hara and deciding to "think about that tomorrow"?

I have always deeply resented the "heartwarming" stories I see on TV of people who through positivity, grit and determination overcome a disease or a disability.  The partial paraplegic who is lauded for learning to walk again, to me, is a not so subtle put down of the person whose physical condition is unable to be overcome.  Positivity and determination WILL NOT allow someone with a severed spinal cord to walk, it doesn't allow someone with MS to halt the degeneration of their body, and it doesn't make my aches, pains and fatigue disappear.  I resent this slight against the people, of whom I am one, who have real constant issues that won't go away.

Getting fired or laid off is a REAL problem and is not as easily surmounted as those who have job security might think.  Studies about stress and satisfaction have indicated that seeing the final outcome of your labours is intrinsic to having less stress, a better self image, and a sense of accomplishment.  Is there anything more dissatisfying than sending resume after resume into the ether and receiving NO response?  Having a positive attitude becomes like a drug that requires a regular "fix".  You write a cover letter and send it off with high hopes and visions of success... you never hear back... you write another and hope again... etc etc....  There is a point at which pasting on the smile and imagining yourself in the position becomes kind of sad and desperate, and where you could easily fit into that classic definition of insanity - doing the same thing and expecting different results.  Sure if you get an interview and have a chance to actually meet someone THAT is the time for pumping yourself up like an East German female weight lifter and being UBER POSTIVE TO THE POWER OF 10!

I have stepped out of my comfort zone in this life more than almost anyone I know - almost every time I have seen an opportunity I have reached for it - and quite a few of those chances have failed and damaged me financially, physically and emotionally.  The simple act of leaping into the unknown wrapped in your positive attitude is DANGEROUS!  I took what at the time I described as "calculated risks" - I should have realized that I wasn't good at maths and that my calculations might be flawed!  Don't get me wrong, I have no regrets and I wouldn't give back the depth of experience I have gained through taking chances.  I have busted my comfort zone over and over and I will bust out of it again very soon I am sure - just as soon as I lick my wounds and try to heal a little from the damage caused last time.

My mother used to say "Hope for the best and prepare for the worst."  Mum was a child during The Great Depression and was one of the most positive and genuinely upbeat people I have ever known.  Her zest for life and rollicking enthusiasm were evident to anyone who had the privilege to meet her and I hope that I have inherited some of that spark.  She was right in her pessimistic optimism and I really believe the world would be a better place if BIG business and BIG government took a leaf from her book.