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Image Credit: Ryoko Suzuki (Japanese, b. 1970). Bind, 2001. Lambda print. Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography. (Photo: Courtesy of Zeit-Foto Salon, Tokyo)
It is not possible for me to fight and write at the same time. While I try to deal with the issues of politics in my personal surroundings, I end up thinking and thinking. All my creativity is expressed in creating the environment which of course will carry something to be changed. My life has been in the same pace creating myself and the immediate surroundings. In order to write, and get paid, I felt I should stop fighting. I felt I should relax. And that was the phase when I started realizing that I’m left with no choice than to be politically incorrect. That being politically correct was an occupation, demanding fulltime and energy. When I’m hungry I go mad. When my sleep is affected, I go mad. This is different from the madness I had when I suffered a claustrophobic existence in the patriarchal society. This is not a creative madness.
I started identifying myself as more incorrect politically than correct.
I am confused about the concept of self and self building that is in the centre of our feminism. There are people who cannot afford to create themselves. There are life situations where democracy is bullshit. I began to incorporate a different aspect to my life. I started entertaining dependency. When I look back, I can find exactly where I started shedding the helping nature in the name of constructing self by oneself. It was the lived experiences of upper caste feminists. It was their convictions that I lived. It is their idea of feminism to which individualism is the core. When one is tired of fighting and of thinking one has to take up what is in the dominant culture. At all the phases when I was tired I took up the positions of upper caste feminists. All the politics I stood for is infected by certain logic based on unreality- or mis reality.
Why am I writing this here?
There must be authors that you can suggest which if I had vast reading to claim , I would have quoted here. People can suggest big names that go with this writing. And I welcome any attempt to reconstruct this piece of writing into any other form which would make it more like an article.
This is a fragmentary writing.
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June 17th, 2009 at 5:36 AM
Just a reflection on what is written. Wonder fragmentation is only of writing. I feel it is also of understanding, or at least in my case it is of that. Otherwise software programmes could have created better writing with more vocabulary etc. I had an idea that my English is of no good and thats the reason why I can't make it to an article, but always to a comment or an exclamation. But then what is an article? Isn't it a reflection/commentary of something which is written/ something which you understand?
I also feel like all writing is collaborative. As language is always of communication between atleast some people, as there are shared meanings, how can one write independent thoughts. One can add colour to things, one can make commentaries of, but howto a new beginning?
How does one escape a lived reality totally? For example an ex 'elite feminist' or an ex 'naxalite' or an ex 'man' ? We keep encountering the past in life. When taken at the extremes one cannot be dependent or independent. One can ponder over something written. One can look our for elements which are left out and create something new.
'Create something new'? Yes, by changing ways of looking, changing the place one live, changing the social life. Can't an 'upper caste Kerala feminist' marginalise herself? I think being on the periphery, spying one's life one can renew. Otherwise we will all be in our boxes. As upper caste, as straight, as mallu, as man, as activist etc.
June 17th, 2009 at 8:16 AM
Before commenting on this article, I would like some clarification from the fishpond administrators.. The 'recent comments' section is missing on the main page now. Why?
June 17th, 2009 at 9:29 AM
Dear sudeep,
We migrated to Disqus commenting platform for better interactivity, presentation & archival of commenting system. As a part of this some interface changes are made. You can use the 'Recent' tab on Right sidebar Disqus widget (popular is the default) to see 4 recent comments. Also commenting system is now connected with twitter & facebook in addition to Disqus. Also we included the option for video commenting too ..
I know the sidebar widget is little annoying. We will migrate to a better looking sidebar option very soon.
June 17th, 2009 at 9:09 PM
I enjoyed a reading of the your reflections with what I have written and a reading of this image(this photo was selected by a friend whose sensibility is different from mine. we had arguments and finally i felt it's interesting to have different layers of sensibility in a post) with it.
I see the sentences and the understanding behind it to be refined by later conversations.
thanks.
June 18th, 2009 at 7:54 AM
Ok.. let us try refining it.
'I started realizing that I’m left with no choice than to be politically incorrect..'
-It is not clear why. I don't think it is politically incorrect to go mad when you are hungry.. or if you don't get sleep.
'There are life situations where democracy is bullshit..'
-There could be.. but what situations are we talking about here?
'I started entertaining dependency..'
-Of what kind? Is it about others being dependent on you or the other way?
'When one is tired of fighting and of thinking one has to take up what is in the dominant culture..'
-What aspects of the dominant culture?
'At all the phases when I was tired I took up the positions of upper caste feminists. All the politics I stood for is infected by certain logic based on unreality- or mis reality..'
-What positions, and what politics?
June 18th, 2009 at 8:57 AM
these are scattered thoughts and feelings. I may be able to fill up the gaps and join the fragments sometime later.
June 18th, 2009 at 6:47 PM
Being politically incorrect : my intolerance to people who are not gender sensitive. we are living in a closed room in Delhi where we make sure that no one who is not sensitive to the ideas we hold are around. we cannot afford to be with people who are more patriarchal. Because we will spend time reacting.
I am talking about a phase when i began to feel that way.
I'm living my “liberated” life protected by the upper class aura.
I'm keeping away from engaging with people to get into academics, or into other institutions like writing to keep pace with more privileged people.
June 18th, 2009 at 6:57 PM
I don't really know the idea of democracy. Is it that you have to count the opinions of the majority who forms a society. Then at the small communities that we form we are supposed to live with the emotions of those majority who are not gender sensitive or caste sensitive. We will have to form a mechanism not to hurt the rights of everyone. And most often i end up taking control of the situation with a dominating voice when i engage that society.
June 18th, 2009 at 7:06 PM
self construction is possible for those people who are to an extend privileged? I was all for self construction because I knew from an earlier phase of my life that I can earn for myself. While engage with our parents, siblings and friends who in a patriarchal mindset demand dependency, we expect them to accept the ideas of self. We deny the stages where someone wants others to take decision for her/him. Isn't this extreme? Isn't this coming from those section of society which has some social security? Can I appy this to the life people associated with me who are from lower class, and caste, with less or no education?
June 18th, 2009 at 7:13 PM
“When one is tired of fighting and of thinking one has to take up what is in the dominant culture.”
I mean the dominant theories. Here, feminist theories as available to us. I was referring to the lack of sufficient voices from lower caste, lower class people to get help from while I cannot think for myself.
June 18th, 2009 at 7:20 PM
earlier comment explains the last question. I wanted people with more developed faculties who have experienced such situations and asked these questions to themselves, explain this. As Mashari has done.
that's why I've posted this without waiting for clarity.
That was the process of thinking, what I've posted in the article part.
June 21st, 2009 at 1:06 AM
My ‘self” is a reflexive moment. It is connected to other, though bounded temporally. When I identify as upper caste feminist, I touch the border of the other. I am defined by the other. No absolute independence at any moment. It is political touch, not bothered of correctness.