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Written by Dr. Caroline Norma her piece is about running up against the male centric Left in Australia. Inside her essay though are a couple of paragraphs that deserve extra attention. The notion that appearance and allegiance to the right things is taking precedence over effective action is an important idea. Coming together despite the differences between the groups involved has been vital in forming effective action in society. Fragments of groups working apart can be nullified and marginalized by the forces of the status quo in light of the recent gender-identity dust up, it would seem the fragmentation of effective political action is in full swing.
“During those 20 years, no activist in Okinawa had the privilege of being able to pick and choose with whom they built alliances or worked in coalition. Their situation permitted no such liberal luxury, only desperate struggle to build movement numbers. They had to be grateful for any friends they could get. The combined will of the US military and the Japanese government was thrown behind the base construction proposal, and so, facing such a Goliath, unionists, churchgoers, artists, fishermen, and feminist groups like Women Act Against Military Violence joined forces in resistance. Defeat was always a possibility, but coalition members permitted no cracks of movement disunity to open up to make it a certainty.
In places like Okinawa, different and even conflicting groups band together for a common cause. In doing so, they prioritize that cause over everything else — including their ideological purity, public image, and social media credibility. In places like Australia, no similarly strong commitment to a cause exists. On the contrary, the priority is performing outrage about inconsequential things in order to appear as though one cares deeply about the right things. People prefer to be seen as the right kind of people holding the right kind of views over actually achieving anything. Meanwhile, coal mine development, overseas military deployment, housing degradation, reef destruction, and corporate tax rorting proceeds apace.
But the problem isn’t one of laziness or smoke and mirrors distraction. We know from the history of left organizing that ideological fitness tests are applied deliberately for political purposes. They are applied for the benefit of the people whose interests a movement is seeking to advance. How they are applied clearly signals who is being prioritized.
As to whose interests the Australian left is pursuing, the antics over my attendance at the Historical Materialism Sydney conference gave the game away. Questioning the notion that gender is a matter of how we feel about ourselves, rather than a matter of how we have been systematically treated throughout our lives, was turned into a crime more serious than ignoring tens of thousands of Asian women in brothels on every street corner of Australia’s cities. But the comedic disproportion of this scenario wasn’t accidental. It was manufactured in service of male interests that are now coming under pressure from feminist challenge.”
Before getting back into, well, the usual. Let’s go all future bright best possible case land for the New Year.
Just sayn’. Happy New Year folks. :)
Aeon magazine is just a grand cornucopia of interesting facts. My knowledge of medieval sexual practices has been doubled if not trebled by just reading the one article I’ve quoted here. :)
It is fascinating how well we actually did without the scientific method to back up our ‘facts’/ Admittedly there is some wack-a-loonery to be had when it came to medieval medicine, but sometimes they got it right (for the wrong reasons usually though). Katherine Harvey writes:
“Although the most famous cases of death by celibacy relate to male clerics, women were, in their own way, equally vulnerable to this medical problem. According to contemporary medical theory, both sexes produced seed that was necessary for conception – and just like semen, the female seed needed to be expelled from the body during regular sexual intercourse. In a woman who was not sexually active, the seed would be retained within her body; as it built up, it would cause suffocation of the womb. The symptoms of this condition included fainting and shortness of breath, and in the most serious cases it could be fatal. For women, as for men, the best way to avoid death by celibacy was to get married and have regular, Church-sanctioned intercourse with one’s spouse. If this was not possible, there were a range of useful remedies, including restricted diets and vinegar suppositories. Some physicians, however, recommended a rather startling alternative: masturbation.
Unsurprisingly, the medieval Church took a rather dim view of this practice: most medieval penitentials (handbooks for confessors) identified masturbation as a sin, and imposed heavy penances for it – typically around 30 days of fasting, but sometimes as much as two years. On the other hand, masturbation was usually placed towards the bottom of the hierarchy of sexual sins, and confessors were permitted to make some allowance for those (including unmarried youths) who lacked another outlet for their desires. This caveat reflects the Church’s awareness of contemporary medical teachings: it was impossible to ignore the fact that medical authorities from Galen onwards had recommended masturbation as a form of preventative medicine for both men and women.
Later medieval physicians were rarely as explicit as Galen and other ancients. Late medieval medical books rarely mentioned male masturbation. For women lacking regular sexual relations, they offered a variety of treatments, including, stimulation of the genitals (either by the patient or by a medical professional). Such treatments were particularly suitable for women who were suffering from suffocation of the womb. If such a woman could not marry (for example, because she was a nun), and if her life was in genuine danger, then genital massage might be the only solution, and could even be performed without sin. The 14th-century English physician John of Gaddesden thought that such a woman should try to cure her condition through exercise, foreign travel and medication. But ‘if she has a fainting fit, the midwife should insert a finger covered with oil of lily, laurel or spikenard into her womb, and move it vigorously about’.”
It must have been quite the controversy as the medical solution meant you were going to hell. It makes me glad that we can now laugh at people who use terms like “the devil’s doorbell” earnestly. :)
I don’t know how to draw but I made this because I’m tired of people thinking we don’t need feminism. These are just everyday examples of patriarchy, sexism and toxic masculinity. The tip of the misogynist iceberg.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
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