Discussion regarding Pro-/Anti-choice groups, and reactions thereto (spurred by UOA Feminist Collective activity on Facebook

[Feminists UOA, of which I am a member, invites me to join group enititled "Anti-choice groups are NOT welcome at University of Auckland", with the sub-header "We don't want you so go away!!"]

Discussion that follows:

Ross Brighton 30 March at 13:29

While I agree with the sentiment, I'm not sure of the methodology - does censorship/antagonism communicate the kind of ethico-discursive stance that a group such as this exists to promote?

Such can lead to a cementing of positions; preventing, rather than promoting, progressive movement.

designating the university a site of conflict/contention has uncomfortable parallels to the designation of the procreative female body (or the female body in general, or the body in general) as such....

That's my stance at least

Feminists Uoa 30 March at 13:40 Reply

It is our university and we get to say if we want a group to affiliate or not. If we find it offensive we are permitted to vote against it. Just the presence of an anti-choice group at university will cause trauma to students. In my eyes that is reason enough to vote against them affiliating. We believe that the university should be a safe space for all students. Having an active anti-choice group on campus will make it an unsafe space for many people. They want to take away my rights to decide what to do with my body. No other club is trying to do that.

Ross Brighton 30 March at 13:52

Ok. If it's a question of voting then I'm totally in. It is a colonisation of the body, an assertion of proto-property rights in the name of "morality" (would an anti-gay group be permitted?).

Though I would hesitate to employ (discursive) violence against anything other than their (totalising) discourse (unless provoked by the same)

Ross Brighton 30 March at 13:53

May I post this discussion?

Feminists Uoa 30 March at 14:25 Reply

Sweet. I'd like to point out though that the person having this discussion is Alana (me).

Reply:

Questions

A Question for all the girl-poets out there: What are your feelings regarding writing and hysteria? I've just read a paper by Elaine Showalter ("Hysterical Narrative", in Narrative 1.1, Jan '93), that argues that it's association w "women's writing" is counterproductive, because of it's history of negative connotation and as a tool of oppression (the obvious counter-argument would be analogies with the "N-Bomb" and "Queer", etc). My interest in H. comes from my experience of the pathologization of the psychologically non-normative, reclaiming madness as a positive sight of production/expenditure, so I'm not totally clued up on gender here (though I wouldn't consiter myself normatively masculine.... but being a hetrosexual male this becomes a very foggy zone where there is no camp (no pun intended) - I've been both gay-bashed and straight-bashed - would you believe it?))

Any Thoughts?

The Female Body is a Semiotic War Zone

Australia is insane. Via Boing Boing: "Australian Classification Board (ACB) is now banning depictions of small-breasted women in adult publications and films. They banned mainstream pornography from showing women with A-cup breasts, apparently on the grounds that they encourage paedophilia, and in spite of the fact this is a normal breast size for many adult women. Presumably small breasted women taking photographs of themselves will now be guilty of creating simulated child pornography, to say nothing of the message this sends to women with modestly sized chests or those who favour them."

The fascism of "Normality". This pathologises women for not adhering to 'morally' dictated codes over biology, and what is worse, pathologises both these women and those who love them.

I'm not pro- or anti- porn, as I don't have a strong understanding of the theoretical discourse surrounding it (and it tends to be mechanical to the point of farce), but this imposes even more stringency from the signifying regime that already governs value imposed on the female form from outside.

Kate Durbin at Delerious Hem

Delerious Hem once again has it's "this is what a feminist [poet] looks like" forum up and running. Kate Durbin's contribution is especially good. "It is kind of this post-femme-something vomit of the medusa" (Kate Zambreno); "[she] brings in Plath and why she has to be dismissed: she is not disinterested enough. This is also related to why kitsch has to be dismissed: it is everywhere" (Johannes Göransson).

"Say melodrama is the gaudy arena in which teenage girls perform their angst—often in the garb of flamboyant (“aggressive”) and/or over-revealing fashions, and histrionic poetry—which is dismissed by society and the church, including, as these girls turn into women, the church of the academy. However, like Plath’s much-maligned insistences that her despair was on par with the Holocaust, melodrama is the teenage girl’s sadness on steroids.

Say nothing is more melodramatic—and pisses off Mom and Dad more—than claiming to be possessed by the Devil himself.

WHISPER: And the Ouija spells: A T T E N T I O N (Is not all feminist writing some form of noisy attention?)

Say, like the demon, the teenage girl’s body is unearned—and therefore claimed by everyone around her. Stigmata, lipstick mark of Cain’s slutty girlfriend, branded by parents, the government, Urban Outfitters and Teen Vogue. Is there any wonder that her body must turn itself inside out, must vomit upon the world in revolt?"