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A RADICAL PROJECT AN INTERVIEW WITH CATHRINE HOLST ON
FEMINISM BY GORANA OGNJENOVIC AND Lene Auestad GO: WHAT IS feminism? Is feminism only
concerned
with discussing typical issues such as abortion, equal pay and
“teaching” women
in third world countries how oppressed they are? Is it more important
to
identify oneself with the feminist movement or is it more important to
act as a
feminist in daily practice? Is individualism a major problem for
today’s
feminism? LA: I think
individualism is a problem in the sense that there is a fragmentation,
as a
reaction to what happened in the 70’s. One has become very frightened
of being
categorized, of being seen as a typical 70’s feminist. Expressing
oneself as an
individual has become the most important thing; I want to be able to
represent
precisely what I like, and at the same time I claim the right to call
myself a
feminist. Being an individual has become the major focus, to such a
degree that
any cause in question is often completely lost. GO:
Does that mean that feminist theory stands in
need of reform? HOLST: TO ME, IT
IS NOT THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE that people
should refer to
themselves as feminists. The most interesting thing is how people think
and how
they act. When a lot of people in Norway, even men and right-wing
people call
themselves feminists, it is because they accept a general norm of
equality
between the sexes. But this is not so interesting, because this is
something
many people declare without even trying to live up to this norm in
practice. More
important than such declarations is being able to agree on political
issues,
independently of how one refers to oneself. As for the tendency to
repeatedly
point out the fact that women are individuals, and not only members of
a group,
I think this has been a justified reaction to a collectivism that went
too far
in the 70’s, but we may have gone too far in the opposite direction
today. Individualism
as being self-centred, self-absorbed is one kind of individualism.
Another kind
of individualism is moral individualism – according to which each
individual
should be listened to when political projects are concerned. This is
extremely
important. The fact that women with other kinds of experiences have
questioned
the ruling paradigms is precisely what has «opened up» feministic
thinking. For instance, women from other cultures have at least
conceptualized
matters differently. More important than these categories «Are you a
feminist?», «Are you an individualist?» is what you yourself
understand by these concepts. GO: NOT LONG
AGO there was an article in Dagbladet (Norwegian newspaper) where
someone
wrote, in connection with the issue of abortion, that feminism has
taken more
human lives than Nazism. Where is this coming from? Why do some people
find
feminism so offensive? Which sensitive point does feminism irritate
since the
reactions can be so brutal? HOLST: WHAT MOST
PEOPLE FAIL TO UNDERSTAND is that feminism
demands very
radical social changes. It is one of the most
radical projects there is. To demand equality between the sexes, to
really
grasp what that means. I am not even saying that it is unproblematic,
an
egalitarian society with regard to gender, where you shall not expect
different
degrees of self-sacrifice from women and men – these things are
so deeply
culturally grounded. I think this could change our society in
unforeseeable
ways – and in rather problematic ways if we are not able to
develop new forms
of solidarity that do not rest on the traditional gender pattern and on
the
subordination of women. We are very strongly shaped by the cultural
expectations of what it means to be a woman or a man, which leads to
aggression
in a lot of people. If codes of gender are too radically overstepped,
they
cannot take it, they are deeply worried by it. Another reason for the
aggression is that private and public issues are so easily connected,
both to
women and to men, when feminism is discussed. Some relate it to their
divorce.
Some may have experienced assaults. Events in one’s life, personal
upsetting experiences,
or personally very enriching experiences, can very easily be linked
with the
feminist political agenda. Thus it becomes very difficult to lead a
public
conversation where issues and persons are kept apart. CULTURE AND
VIOLENCE GO: My understanding of feminism as
“narrow-minded” is connected with
the fact that in this country a lot of the arguments go around the two
issues,
abortion and equal pay for women and man. Both of these issues for
someone who
comes from a socialist society were not feminist issues. Where we come
from
there was no difference in pay between women and men, and abortion was
allowed.
For example in the advance Western countries we encounter a lot of
women who
say that they are feminists, and then they enter a marriage where they
endure
an awful lot, only because there is a societal norm stating that you
should not
be alone, you shall have a family. It is a kind of cynicism – a
lot of people
are feminists just as long as it suits their life style. As you also
wrote
about the feminist movement in Afghanistan, foreign policy is one
thing,
feminism is a Western product, another thing is having it out with
oneself –
are all the feminists in theory also feminists in practice? HOLST: This is
why these issues are so hard
to discuss. It is bound up with the
entire idea of heterosexual love. Is it possible to desire someone
within a
wholly equal relationship? The underlying issues are beliefs that when
you
desire someone, there is a certain inequality. The sustenance of desire
demands
that one of the parties should be subordinate. But is it not possible
to
develop forms of life where desire may well be linked with difference
– but not
with patriarchate and being heterosexual? A
colleague of mine has studied gender equality in the Czech Republic,
where
women were integrated in the labour marked and had completely equal
wages. Yet
they worked double to an extreme degree, doing all the work in the
home, and
the number of rapes was high. But precisely because the sexes were
officially
equal, these things were difficult to discuss. GO: How much do
we really know about how women in Morocco, Iran, and Iraq are really
suppressed, as we believe them to be? How much do we really know about
what are
they doing about their own situation? HOLST: This needs
to be examined. Pointing
to such
general features of other cultures is very comfortable, it is not very
daring,
while it is also of course very important to point to where it is the
case that
they are oppressive. This is where social anthropologists perform very
valuable
work with in-depth studies of cultural contexts. What may appear in a
certain
way on the surface may also have different sides to it. There are
interesting
discussions among feminists about these questions. Non-Western gender
researchers
have seen things which Western feminists have regarded as being obvious
examples of patriarchal practises as having different aspects to
them. GO: THERE IS
ALSO A PROBLEM OF SYSTEMATICALLY EXECUTED VIOLENCE like in
ex-Yugoslavia, where
men where symbols of power, while women performed power in other ways.
Once
society was lawless the aggression was immediately released. How could
anyone
commit such crime, take part in a mass rape without thinking that one
day the
war will be over – the next day you shall have to live with it?
What are the
odds that the same thing could have happened here, tomorrow, if this
state
would turn lawless, where the power asymmetry is shaped in a slightly
different
form? HOLST:
One thing
is that violence occurs, but why does exactly this kind of violence
arise? Why
is it that one makes men do such things to women? Why do they not
rather direct
their aggression towards the ones who are to blame? It is terrible, and
deeply
depressing. I think it has something to do with what happens when men
feel that
they loose respect. I think some deeply rooted cultural mechanisms are
at work
here. Even when men are raised in an enlightened culture, are highly
educated
and so on, and again such things can happen. Enlightenment and
cultivation suddenly
turn out to be very superficial – patriarchy is still alive and
well in most
places, if not always easily visible, it exists in the
underground. WOMEN AND
MEN IN THE ACADEMIC WORLD GO: OFTEN ONE MEETS feminist
female academics who appear to be so uncomfortable
with themselves as women. They take over a male language and are purely
power-oriented. How can they be capable of enlightening others when
they live
in this way themselves? They build up an ideology that they do not
believe in,
or practice. They can even behave worse than men in the system of
power. Hence
the question is: Is the point of the whole thing to become the same as
a man? HOLST: WOMEN MUST CONTINUOUSLY relate to this as a conflict, while men do not need to do so. And all of this is not necessarily conscious. Cultivating oneself takes heavy work no matter where one is. If one is to change a culture, there must be a mass that is capable of critical thinking to change that culture’s norms and ethos. One demands too much of singular women in male-dominated cultures when one expect them to be able to achieve a change all by themselves. It often becomes a strategy that one, as a woman, must prove oneself to be even better than men. I often see that women in male-dominated academic environments either have organized themselves on the outside, at the cost of their influence, or that they are inside and have become as hard as nails. I am thinking that they must have been put to some hard tests that have made them like that. But I have also met many socialist-men who hardly live as they teach, to put it mildly. I find no reason why one should demand more, humanly regarded, of women than of men. After all, the author must be distinguished from the text. There are an awful lot of unpleasant professors, furthermore, that aren’t feminists. THERE IS A FUNDAMENTAL feminist
insight in all of this – the fact that one discusses female
academics and the
way in which they deal with their sexual identity. We do not in fact
discuss
men in that way. It must be lovely to work within public institutions
as a man
and avoid that kind of questioning of one’s conduct with regard
to gender. I
myself notice how I repeatedly think of how as appear as
“gender”. In the
academic world it is very important to be taken seriously. Many women
have told
me of the fact that they have “lost” in an academic setting
if their male
conversation partner becomes to “conscious” of speaking to
a woman – she is
then no longer seen as an equally competent scholar. But I think it is
different
if one finds oneself in a research environment that is more mixed with
regard
to gender. GO: One does
observe many men who call themselves feminists, but their support of
feminism
is purely strategic. LA: THERE IS
ALSO THIS VERY COMMON CULTURAL OPPOSITION between something being very
feminine
on the one hand and serious on the other, or very sexy on the one hand
and
serious on the other. HOLST: This is something very unfair. While being a male academic can be very potent, you can be a very sexual person, and while many male professors are able to pick up lots of women, 60-year-old female professors are not regarded as being equally sexy. This is not only intended in a trivial sense, it is an interesting fact in itself that a male intellect is much more easily compatible with sexuality. Karin Widerberg wrote about this in Kunnskapens kjønn (The Gender of Knowledge). She puts some of this into words in this book, how she felt that there was a split between the head and the body, how she experienced thinking a lot about her appearance and felt that there were clear limits to how she could behave, how far she could go before being reduced to a kind of object of desire. I find that story very sad. GO: It
is
something one hears from the business world, that the presentation is
part of
the work. Body and clothes is part of the presentation. It is
problematic when
men sexualise us, but when we are sexualising ourselves for the purpose
of
manipulating them in the work situations, then suddenly all that does
not seem
as bad. HOLST:
THERE ARE
LOTS OF STRONG MYTHS ABOUT THIS. It takes very little, in a university
context
as well, before there are rumours that women get things through sex.
These
stories are usually completely unfounded. Another thing is that bosses
want
their mistresses to be mistresses, not to employ them. I do not know of
any
woman who has gotten a position at the university because of having
slept with
someone. What happens in such a case is that she has to find a position
somewhere else, because she is not taken seriously in that environment.
It is
ruthless. I think these are all problems that men can allow themselves
not to
relate to. The attitude is often that women can just get out and do
something
else. But what else should they then be doing? Stay at home? There are
some
female academics that have a very feminine style, with low necklines
and so on.
I find that cool, but at the same time I imagine it must cost them a
lot. RESPONSIBILITY
AND EXPERIENCE LA: RECENtLY THERE HAVE BEEN DEBATES
about why I, as a woman, should feel particularly obligated to act in
solidarity with other women because I am a woman. GO: My recent
experience from the US is that younger women actually protest against
their tax
money being used for paying benefits to single mothers; or against the
use of
helping agencies that provide services for protecting only
women’s causes, such
as giving a free legal services for women that had run of from their
abusive
husbands and risk loosing everything (including the children) just
because they
are living in shelters and do not have money to pay a lawyer. There is
something about neo-liberalism that has struck; there is a lack of will
to
identify not only with mistreated women, but also with anyone who is in
need in
general. LA: The
interesting question is whether there is some kind of special
obligation. Does
everyone have the same obligation, or are some people, due to specific
kinds of
experiences, more obligated than others? HOLST: THIS IS AN
INTERESTING QUESTION. Middle class men often confront women of the
middle class
with their lack of solidarity with working class women. But then men of
the
middle class are supposedly also responsible for correcting injustice,
both to
women and to men of the working class. It is difficult to put into
words what
“women’s solidarity” is or should be. I am unable to
conceptualize it fully. It
appears crueler if women do not protest against the closing down of
women’s
refuges than if men fail to do so. One could of course say: Women who
fail to
protest do not know their own good, since all women could possibly end
up in a
situation where they need women’s refuge shelters to go to. But
that would be a
purely instrumental justification based on self-interest. The point is
that it
gives rise to an extra moral indignation when women do not stand up for
other
women. Is this indignation justified or not? I am not fully in
agreement with
myself at this point. One problem is that men with power can be let off
the
hook far too easily if the problems of women are to be made
women’s
responsibility only. Take sexualized violence, for example. Even the
minimal
“night watchman-state” is to protect the citizens from
violence. It is a
fundamental right. There is no reason why men should not react to it. GO: BUT ARE WE
ABLE TO CHANGE the interpretation of such social symbols so quickly
through
political changes? HOLST: It is about
the limitations of politics. There was a larger optimism on this point
in the
earlier days of the feminist movement. There is a limit to how much you
can
change through political methods and everyday practices. One can, for
instance,
give the same toys to boys and to girls, do all of the similar things
that we
can do, and still there are things which remain deeply rooted in our
culture. LA: And then
the parents have at the same time communicated a lot unconsciously. HOLST: Yes,
precisely. This is what feminist psychoanalysis has focused on. Even
those that
have the best possible intentions and are very conscious, communicate
things
that they never meant to communicate.
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