::nods:: The worst part, and what I really hate about the state of the current kerfufflation (it's a word if I say it is!) re gender-and-comics, is when there are people with opposing viewpoints who genuinely are interested in trying to understand each other's positions, and maybe achieving that 'greater mutual understanding,' but we're drowned out by all the people yelling about how 'the other side' is evil, wrong and stupid.
It reminds me of something that happened during the Camp Trans event at the 1999 Michigan Womyn's Music Festival. Assorted trans-folk camped out across the street from the festival land, inviting anyone who wanted to over to talk, but mostly just being there in protest of MWMF's anti-trans policy. Some individual transpeople crossed the picket, as it were, to attend workshops or visit vendors or grab a shower, or whatever, and some of the official festival attendees got downright (for lack of a less-loaded term) hysterical about it, to the point of sending little girls around the camp as runners warning women that there were men with naked penises invading the festival. So then Camp Trans orchestrated an actual little parade, with an escort of festival-attendee women, to walk along the main loop of road and then leave again. And later that evening, the festival organisers set up a meeting on festival land, under a big tent, for festival-goers and Camp Trans people to have an open discussion. A lot of that got fairly heated, but it was kept reasonably civil by having people only talk during their own turn, based on a sign-up sheet that got handed around throughout the discussion. But about an hour into this really landmark sitting-down-and-trying-to-listen-to-each-other event, some random festival attendee walked up near the outside of the tent and started yelling, 'You're raping me! You're raping me! Stop raping me!' Which, well, was about as useless a contribution to the debate as could be imagined.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2005-08-18 10:37 am (UTC)It reminds me of something that happened during the Camp Trans event at the 1999 Michigan Womyn's Music Festival. Assorted trans-folk camped out across the street from the festival land, inviting anyone who wanted to over to talk, but mostly just being there in protest of MWMF's anti-trans policy. Some individual transpeople crossed the picket, as it were, to attend workshops or visit vendors or grab a shower, or whatever, and some of the official festival attendees got downright (for lack of a less-loaded term) hysterical about it, to the point of sending little girls around the camp as runners warning women that there were men with naked penises invading the festival. So then Camp Trans orchestrated an actual little parade, with an escort of festival-attendee women, to walk along the main loop of road and then leave again. And later that evening, the festival organisers set up a meeting on festival land, under a big tent, for festival-goers and Camp Trans people to have an open discussion. A lot of that got fairly heated, but it was kept reasonably civil by having people only talk during their own turn, based on a sign-up sheet that got handed around throughout the discussion. But about an hour into this really landmark sitting-down-and-trying-to-listen-to-each-other event, some random festival attendee walked up near the outside of the tent and started yelling, 'You're raping me! You're raping me! Stop raping me!' Which, well, was about as useless a contribution to the debate as could be imagined.