Missing Blog Posts(Weeks April 6-10 and April 13-17)

April 6-10:

In both nascent liberal states and dictatorial states, we see a clear and deliberate effort to regulate the personal lives of men, women, and families. These attempts essentially stem from the same impulse: control. It can be argued that a newly independent state is only attempting to regulate the personal lives of its citizens while a new social order is being put into place, but as we often see — the regulation of specifically women almost always continues even after the “growing pains” of independent and liberal statehood, even when there are marked attempts to ingratiate women within the larger goals of the state. As someone who is mostly familiar with the Cuban Revolution and Fidel Castro through the relationship with the USSR and the US, it frankly surprised me that Castro called out his, and by extension, the rest of the country’s, internalized misogyny (“even her own class scorned and underrated her”). Before reading Murray’s chapter, I assumed that this type of recognition of internal biases and prejudices would be more contemporary. However it is important to note that after claiming that he recognized that he used internalized misogyny (he uses different words), he now claims that Cuba is both free of misogyny and also racism, which speaks to his limited understanding of what it actually takes to dismantle the structural pillars of misogyny and racism (this is definitely part of a more contemporary discussion of oppression, and therefore the expectation might be anachronistic).

In this same vein, I think it’s fascinating that in the case of the Nicaraguan revolution, there is a very clear through line as to the politicization and radicalization of the not just women, but poor women, and how that was recognized by the FSLN who, like Castro, officially recognized that the actual revolution itself did not end in women’s emancipation, with Tomas Borge publicly stating that “women remain fundamentally in the same condition as the past.” I think that, interestingly, the Nicaraguan revolution shows a clearer connection between class and gender and how that leads to politicization and the rise of socialist action than Cuba, who pursued a governmental system that was far truer to the tenets of Marxism than Nicaragua’s.

April 13-17:

I feel like when I think about the use of the word feminism historically, and often by groups who include feminism as part of their ethos but are not strictly feminist or politcal groups, I feel like its used essentially as a synonym for a politicized or political women (often viewed by the opposition as radical and threatening). This is, in part, why I found this set of readings so interesting. As the perceived left-ist or feminist groups that are being discussed are more traditional and apolitical than the right-wing group (or are put in a position where they need to conform to more traditional roles and assumptions for their safety). Both the Madres de Plaza de Mayo and Poder de Feminino were based in the non-political role of motherhood, but they have very different claims and aims. The Madres are “without partisan affiliations” and their “objectives are humanitarian”, they don’t even claim their children’s innocence, they simply want to know “where they are and [crimes] they are accused of” (Murray, Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo). They are only seen as political because they acknowledge the detainments and disappearances. This basic act of caring for their children, the number one job of mothers, has them deemed terrorists by the junta and stripped of their “right to motherhood” (Murray, Diane Taylor; 274). Whereas, PF, had leaders who had “years of political experience” regularly asserted that they “did not understand politics” since they defined it as a male activity and that their actions were “solely to protect their children”. (Murray, Power; 259) Their children were not in direct harm, like the Madres de Plaza de Mayor, they claimed motherhood as a political shield to “chase military men, troops, and officers alike, to action by questioning their masculinity”. (Murray, Power; 262) They had a clear role in the violent military uprising, and were routinely credited by the military. That is radical, political action.

Cosse’s article obviously is a bit different. She’s looking at women within radical socialist organizations, not women’s groups. But still, within her piece, she shows us very clearly that avowed leftist women were also forced into demoting the importance of gender equality, and were not really allowed to exist outside of the traditional conception of women and women’s roles, within these socialist groups. In the ERP women were expected to marry and have babies, as outlined in the 1972 rulebook of sorts, “Moral y proletarizacion”. (Cosse, 432) This, in effect, remove’s women’s agency within their own personal life. This same type of hypocrisy was also rampant amongst the Montoneros who could punish infidelity with death, and forced their members to report all personal relationships to their superiors. These groups were explicitly Marxist, and perhaps on the outside more “feminist” than their opposition, yet the ways in which the men who led these groups organized and centralized their power always comes by the repression of women.

The short film brings up something we’ve been discussing in class since probably the second week of class: family is considered to be the microcosm of the nation. In revolution women/mothers are allowed to do anything for their families/nation and it is deemed admirable, just as long as they stop when it’s deemed inappropriate. Wanting to know where your child is, as opposed to cajoling men into an armed uprising against the government, is not radical and is barely political.