Already Thinking More Clearly
I am a white Gentile USer. In the weeks before the Middle-Class Women’s Workshop1 I couldn’t remember my connections to any of the women who would be there. When I got there, I felt alone and feared it had been a mistake to come. I was reminded of middle school, where internalized sexism had divided me from other middle-class females through pressure about our appearance, fighting over boyfriends, and so on. On Saturday I discharged heavy terror, and by that night I could tell2 that I liked the other women and felt close to the group. I laughed a lot.
In the end, being with a hundred and thirty middle-class women—including women from Mexico, Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom; women of the global majority; and many young adult women—contradicted the early isolation that is the basis for my agreeing to give up my mind and integrity as a middle-class woman. (However, as Diane points out, none of us can have complete integrity under capitalism, because the system lacks integrity.)
Diane did a demonstration with a white Gentile U.S. woman about her job and the middle-agent role3 that many of us middle-class women play. It showed how our early material4 sets us up and how we can face it, discharge it, and give up pretense about our role in the world. My mind now has some space to look at my role as support staff at an owning-class university, where my work helps people to stay or become owning class.
Diane held out that we can decide to completely value women’s work and unpaid labor, including the work of RC leadership. This is helping me to be in charge of my agenda and efforts in the world and to value myself and my female mind, which will make me more effective in fighting for liberation. I am already thinking and communicating more clearly, directly, and powerfully.
Somerville, Massachusetts, USA
Reprinted from the RC e-mail discussion list for leaders of women
1 A workshop held in Baltimore, Maryland, USA, in February 2015, led by Diane Balser, the International Liberation Reference Person for Women
2 "Tell" means notice, see.
3 "Middle-agent role" means role of being the visible agents of the oppressive society.
4 "Material" means distress.