Why don't you relax Justin?
Mine
---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 17 May 2000 10:37:30
-0400 (EDT) From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:19100] Re: Re: Re: Re: RE:
Genderization (fwd
OK, fair enough. I would not focus too much on P's early Women at the Edge of
Time--she has written a lot of books since--and I would not necessarily try to read a
novelist's own opinions off the surface of her novels. just because P wrote a book
about the Weather Underground doesn't mean she advocates bombing. I think P would
agree with you about why we on the left want men to share childraising; she needn't
think that we men can't do it unless we have our works fixed. P imagines a utopia, but
it is not a perfect world; one of her string suits is to write utopian fiction that
does not depicta n ideal state. Ursula K. LeGuin did that in The Dispossessed too. As
for Firestone, I think she's great, bit primitive as a theorist, but I learned a lot
from her work. Perhaps I should say that I am from that period myself, which may be
why I reacted that way to what I took to be an ignorant slam at one of the people
important to forming my own (very unbiologically determist) sensibilit!
!
!
y. --jks
In a message dated Tue, 16 May 2000 10:50:33 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
<<
from my reading of her, she was making a radical feminist case
(radical alteration of biological identity as to make men feed babies).she
might be a figure on the left, which i am not denying. in the begining of
the second wave feminist movement, socialist and radical feminists were in
the same camp, and then they departed for several reasons. but in
so far as her "biological idealism" is concerned,I would not "typically"
charecterize Marge Piercy as a marxist feminist. it is not my purpose to
bash her, so I don't understand why you get emotionally offensive. we are
discussing the "nature" of her argument here.. I did *not* say she is
"beyond the pale" because she is not a Marxist..You had better read my
post once again..
Schulamit was a figure on the left too. so what? are we not gonna
say something about her work?
let's drop off this dogmatic way of thinking..
Mine
>Maybe you better read some Marge Piercy and cure your ignorance of her
work. She is one of the premier literary figures on the left, tio whose
novels and poetry,a nd, yes, political writing, several generations of
leftists owe a lot. I also get tired of line-drawing ("She's not an
Marxist Feminist," so not on ythe left, so beyond the pale). It's one
reason I gave up on labels of thsi sort. Does P hold the views you ascribe
to her? I don't thonk so. Has she fought the good fight for almost 40
years? You better believe it. --jks
In a message dated 5/16/00 5:18:18 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
<< Marge Piercy is not a Marxist feminist. Thus, it is
difficult for me to understand what her relevance to leftism is, because
she evidently suffers from biological essentialism. Feminists like Marge
Piercy belongs to what we know as radical feminist tradition. The big
problem with her argument is that she assumes "gender inequality" stems
from "biological inequality", the type of argument proposed by Schulamit
Firestone in the 70s in the _Dialectics of Sex_. Since she sees the
problem in the biology, but not in the gendered system, she offers
"biological alteration" as a form of "cultural solution" to inequality
problem--the problem which does not originate in biology to begin with
(men and women may be biologically different but not unequal!!!). so she
effectively perpetuates the sexist biological discourses.. Piercy is also
naive to expect technology to liberate women or socialize men into
feminine practices.
We (socialist feminists) want MEN to feed babies not because they should
be "biologically recreated" to do so (since the problem is NOT in the
biology), but because it is "desirable" that men and women share mothering
equally!! Mothering is a social function, it does not lie in women's
biological disposition. I refuse Marge Piercy type of feminist
discource that idealizes and radicalizes motherhood as a form of new
intimacy!! >>
>>
