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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (April 21, 2000)
: * apri 2 L 2QQQ 24J I f t V iE W SUBURBAN $ SUZUKI "r A Esi . ini i Ki i > T< » h i Y« m k L il i ! ( , t \ K \ n 1111> I< > Fu Vi h k Hi i h . i i ! G rand V ita ra B lo w o u t Sale! ALL Are On Sale! Not Just 1 or 2! Take Advantage Of These Prices and 5.9% APR 2000 V-6 GRAND VITARAS SK * ST0046 ST0049. ST0061 ST0062. ST0064 MSRP...................... $19,749 Suburban $4 Discount... ' 2,754 7 in Stock $ 1 ( ^ 0 0 ^ 3 at This Price I 2000 V-6 GRAND VITARA 4 DOOR A U TO M A TIC SK # ST0006. ST0011, ST0035, ST0036 ST0048, ST0068. ST0063. ST0065 | MSRP...................... $20,749 Suburban $ ' Discount.. 2,754 : 13 in Stock 8 at this pnce $4 "7 Q Q C I I 2000 V-6 GRAND VITARA A U TO M A T IC SK * ST0025. ST0042. ST0043 MSRP......................$23,149 Suburban Discount.. 3,154 * 19,995 * 3 at This Pnce nr SK # SC 0041, SC 0050, SC0056 SC0057 M S R P ....................... $13,849 Suburban Discount.. 2,854 10,995 * 16 in Stock $ 4 in Stock !000 EST ALL $3354 OFF MSRP! SK * SC 0049. SC0051. SC0053 M S R P ....................... $13,349 Suburban Discount. * instock at This Pnce 3,354 $Q Q Q C V y v w V Don’t Pay More! SUBURBAN SUZUKI 5 0 3 - 668-5515 Special Incentives Make This Sale Possible 5 9% APR on approved credit Prices Good Through April 17. 2000 On Hwy 26 In Sandy. Oregon S e e us at/www getauto com /sububansuzuki Tough questions, frank answers An interview with Alix Dobkin Continued from the cover Give me your 30-second pitch for femi nism in general and separatism in particular. Why is women-only space so important? When women figured out their personal and global relationship to men and then con ferred value upon their own lives, it was called “feminism”— the smartest, most comprehen sive, incisive, effective and most fun political analysis there is or has ever been on Earth. I didn’t know until I began my research for this interview that you’re a musician— and a famous one at that. Which came first for you, music or feminism, and how did the two intersect? Music was as much a part of my upbringing as radicalism. I was raised on folk music, Com munist politics, and the belief (learned in Yid- dish-Jewish culture) that entertainment should always be educational. 1 discovered feminism in my 30s. I’ve also read that you were married before coming out as a lesbian in the early ’70s. Did you think or feel you were a les bian before you came out publicly? What prompted your coming out? I was married for about 6 years before dis covering feminism, which gave me the political context to come out as a Lesbian, which I real ized was what 1 had wanted to do all along but didn’t because: 1) 1 liked a) men b) sex with men c) heterosexual privilege. 2) Being so Communist-identified in my youth was “outsider” enough for me. 1 couldn’t bear the thought or the burden of being a Les bian too. In college 1 met my first Lesbians who I liked, but whose life I couldn’t identify with, since it revolved around bar culture, which I didn’t relate to. Plus many of the women scared me and the “life” didn’t attract me. Women-only space is important for many, many reasons, some of which are that: We can relax and discover, create, invent who we are and have terrific and unrestricted fun together without worrying, thinking, taking care of, defending against, amusing, justifying our exis tence, trying to impress or soothe the feelings of non women. I found the following quote in promotion al materials prepared by the women’s studies Now for the thorny stuff! Portland has a department at Portland State University, very vocal trans activist community, and the where you’ll be lecturing: “ In 1974 she re Lesbian Community Project— which is spon leased the first recording of music by, about soring the May 5 herstory forum you’ll be and for women, Laven der Ja n e Loves Wo Since men (patriarchy) invented "masculine" men.” That seems like a and "ifeminine" and defined everything, including pretty bold claim, to be the first of anything. what "woman" means, for the purpose o f control and Where would you place domination, and since men were forced to then project yourself in the history of women’s music? onto women a suppressed portion o f male character, Yes, a “bold claim” how authentic can their perception o f women be? and not precisely accu rate.... The truth is that Especially from anyone who was raised male? Lavender Jane Loves Women was the first LESBIAN record album entirely produced by women. It was also the leading— has been struggling with trans first internationally distributed Lesbian album acceptance and the granting of membership ever produced on the planet. status to men. As such, I’d be remiss if I My friend, journalist and longtime activist didn’t bring up your disinvitation to the 1998 Jim Fouratt (who I hadn’t yet met) described Philadelphia Dyke March. my place in the history of “Women's Music” March organizers gave you a hard time this way: “Alix Dobkin broke the silence, over something you wrote in “ Passover singing loud the word lesbian back in 1973. She Revisited,” one of your Minstrel Blood is the linchpin, the crazy crone who refuses to columns in Chicago Outlines. The offending shut up, singing the praises of women-loving statement was: For over 20 years now, men women thousands of times over the years in have declared themselves ‘women,’ manipu concert halls, back rooms, cleared fields, lated their bodies via experimental surgery, women’s spaces, rallies and marches all over and then demanded the feminist seal of the world. Alix Dobkin and her coven of mad approval from survivors of girlhood.” women birthed the beautiful, liberating noise I’m young, queer, a child of deconstruc called ‘women’s music.’ ” tion and I ve concluded I have to accept oth Additional “first": I was featured performer ers’ gender identities and gender presenta in the first Lesbian music concert tour ever in tions at face value. To me, therefore, a male- Europe in 1979. (There are probably others, to-female transsexual is, was and always will but who can remember?) be a woman, even without surgery. Your statement suggests the opposite, that MTFs are incontrovertibly male— which seems to contradict the feelings and experiences of many M TFs. What would you say to clarify your state ment and convince me you’re not using your vagina-based gender construct to condemn someone whose psychosocial experience of gender is female and whose physical experi ence is that of incon gruity? First of all, although it seems to work for you, “vagina-based gender con struct” does not begin to describe how I define “woman.” I certainly accept the existence of a wide variety of identity on the “gender” spectrum not included or recognized in patriarchal sex-roles, how ever, I am curious about your use of “condemn” to describe my defense of what I consider sacred women’s space. Do you consider not being accept ed as a “woman” [equal to] “condemned"? Furthermore, how can you or any nonwoman know what, in fact, any one’s “psychosocial experi ence of gender” really PfcMAsT** means? “Female” as defined by sex-role stereotype? And does this not reinforce that (male-invented) stereotype? Since men (patriarchy) invented “mascu line” and “feminine" and defined everything, including what “woman” means, for the pur pose of control and domination, and since men were forced to then project onto women a sup pressed portion of male character,* how authentic can their perception of women be? Especially from anyone who was raised male? No, I believe “ incongruity” is a much more accurate description of the “psychosocial expe rience of gender” you describe in addition to the “physical experience” of genuinely trans- gendered persons. *See “The Verb of Gender &. Other 3 Dol lar Bills,” Outlines Minstrel Blood column, Nov. 11, 1998, for more discussion of this proposition. In the same column, you wrote: “ Logical and compelling as our analysis of patriarchy is, not one of us truly escapes.” Is it possible that “ women-bom” sepa ratism— specifically, the exclusion of trans people who don’t fit the authorized definition of “ woman”— is a feminist appropriation of the patriarchal tactic of marking the “ other and assigning status by remarking about the other’s acceptability? Christopher! Do you see what you are doing here? Again, I must remind you that since men have been defining everything, including women, ever since the rise of the patriarchs, your question needs to be regarded in the light that here are men doing it again. But this latest reversal attempts to re-establish, as “Passover Revisited" contends, the access men lost (for just a few years) to our (sacred) women’s space and women’s business. Men are so entitled that you don’t even understand what you are doing, how you are changing the rules when it suits your purpose Women need to define ourselves, and some of us will insist on doing this no matter what postmodernism, social constructionists, or any one else says or does.
