from likely to be fairly high we would ask all comrades who wish to attend to get thei tickets from us as soon as possible (price: 2s 6d). The confrontation will not be confined to the aforementioned speakers but will include contributions from th
she is ' quite good for a girl'. Femininity becomes synonymous with frivolity, stupidity and narrowness. It seems obviously better to be a man. Doesn't she feel like a man, do their things, talk their talk. It is natural for her to define her situation in terms of a kind of sub-manness. THEY tell us what we are. The image is constantly reaffirmed. The books she reads and the films she sees are almost invariably by men. The women characters created by them, however sympathetically and with whatever intuit understanding, must of necessity be the projection of their respons towards women. One is simply not conscious of men writers or mer film makers. They are just writers, just film makers. The reflected image for women they create will be taken straight by women themselves. These characters ' are ' women. Throughout this process the educated girl probably takes her hand over our virginity for a marriage document, a ring, and the obligation of financial support. Orgasm is a matter of merchandise. And remember THEY don't like us to be too clever. Well she might go to University but men want The emphasis in our education tends to be much more on integration, the encouragement of active criticism, of intellectual aggression is rare. The cautious virtues predominate. We are in an intellectual double bind. We are assumed to have nothing to say, find it difficult to assert that we want to say something, are observed to say nothing, To stray from the definition of what ' they' want is to risk being rejected in a double sense. There is a ' moral' force behind this urge to conform. The girl who is critical of the stereotype presented to her can be condemned not simply like a boy as a rebel but as a slut as well. The latter is much more difficult to cope with. There it is still the whole dirty, frightened, patronising world behind slut, tart, old someone who can cook. are assumed to have nothing to say.
Here the subordinated relates to dominator, Here discontent focuses and here the experience is felt, expressed articulated, resisted - through the particular. The particular pummels you gently into passivity. So we don't know how to find one another or ourselves. Wie eden our the station ded of all rest rong id consciousness of our condition. We are in different classes. Thus we devour and use one another. Our 'emancipation' has been often merely the struggle of the privileged to improve and consolidate its superiority - The women of the working class remain the exploited of the exploited, oppressed as workers and oppressed as women. Ok so you've heard it all before Ok so you're bored But meanwhile We still get less pay for the same work as you. We are less likely to get jobs which are at all meaningful In which we have any responsibility. We are less likely to be educated less likely to be unionised. The present set up of the family puts great strains on us either we are struggling to combine badly paid work with bringing up a family or we are unable to do work for which we've been trained. The area of taboo on our sexuality is much more extensive and the double standard still pervasive. Some women still never experience orgasm. So what are we complaining about? 'emancipation' as being beyond question, not worth even stating er slag, nymphomaniac, dolly, bird, chick hit of stuff, bit of crumpet, discussing. The suffragettes happened a long time ago. Men will readily accept her as different, an exception, an interesting diversion. She lives in fact as a man. There might he a hint of strain over her virginity, a flicker of doubt, the discovery of a strange The girl who for some reason breaks away intellectually is in duplicity lurking still in men. a peculiarly isolated position. She finds herself straddled But no connection is obvious. She cannot see a condition of women. across a great gulf, which grows wider, while she is pulled It is not until she becomes older, grows less decorative, has babies, both ways. A most perilous and lonely condition, comparable that the rather deep cracks in the gloss of ' emancipation' appear. to that of a black or working class militant. In the process of She has the rest of her life to explore the limits and ambiguities of becoming interested in ideas she finds herself to some extent her 'freedom". cut off from other girls and inclines naturally towards boys And what a spurious freedom. as friends. They do more interesting things, discuss wider topics. She really defines herself as a boy. Other girls appear We walk and talk and think as living contradictions. curious and rather boring, passive and accepting. She has Most of us find the process too painful and not surprisingly settle little to say to most of them. The social contempt in which for limited liberated areas. We give up struggling on every front and women are held confirms this. She is constantly being told ease into a niche of acceptance. old bag, silly cow, blue stocking. These words have no male equivalents. Some advice