Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Caryn Riswold

Home
Progressive Christian
Moving Justice Forward: VDay 2014?

Moving Justice Forward: VDay 2014?

Last updated on: February 11, 2014 at 11:18 am by Caryn Riswold

Moving Justice Forward: VDay 2014? 2014-02-11T11:18:54-07:00 Caryn Riswold

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Rehearsals for The Vagina Monologues have begun on my campus again this year and I have a lot of jumbled thoughts and reactions to taking the stage with students once again. Things I want the students to know, things I want the world to know, things I want to remember.

When the brave first group of students staged this production on campus here in 2005, they were met with some resistance around use of space. From religious leaders. Participants had anti-feminist and anti-VDay fliers left on their cars. From a religious organization. We had to communicate with security to ensure a safe and successful event.

Today, this is an annual and expected event that barely raises an eyebrow. In some ways, its continued presence has been part of the reason that conversations about gender on campus have changed.

This will be the fifth time I’ve been on stage in our productions of the Monologues, and about the millionth time I have seen and heard them. I remember the first time, a professional production in Denver with my friend Stacie about fifteen years ago… I think we might have bought scalped tickets outside the theatre, it was such a hot show back then. Now, I can almost recite every one of them. In my head, they live on in the voices of specific women I know who have memorably brought them to life over the past decade. Kelsey’s The Flood, Kaitlin and “Bob,” Alisia’s moaning, Nikki’s Angry Vagina, Kelly whose own mother was there in the room, Chandra’s tale of the little coochi snorcher, Jenny asking the nurse to “bring me the vagina!”, Sarah’s lists, Jen and the taffeta ball gown, Jordan and her really smart brain.

I remember trying to explain the concept of a triple orgasm to a young performer … more than once.

I’ve seen this show affect and empower survivors of violence in life-saving ways, which is why I continue to support it … and yet there’s a lot of substantial feminist critique of The Vagina Monologues out there now … do you young performers know this? You need to.

It’s a flawed piece, in many ways. It’s relatively dated in cultural references, it’s heteronormative, East-coast situated (our small-town Midwestern audience never gets the “split knish” reference, among other things), and its author is now widely critiqued for her colonial feminist tendencies. Last year, Lauren Chief Elk critiqued Eve Ensler for her use of indigenous women’s images in service of white feminist activism, calling out Ensler’s ignorance of indigenous women’s activism:

Your organization took a photo of Ashley Callingbull, and used it to promote V-Day Canada and One Billion Rising, without her consent. You then wrote the word “vanishing” on the photo, and implied that Indigenous women are disappearing, and inherently suggested that we are in some type of dire need of your saving. You then said that Indigenous women were V-Day Canada’s “spotlight”. V-Day completely ignored the fact that February 14th is an iconic day for Indigenous women in Canada, and marches, vigils, and rallies had already been happening for decades to honor the missing and murdered Indigenous women.

The Pittsburgh One Billion Rising Campaign this year has responded to this and other criticism of Ensler’s campaign by renaming themselves the “One Billion Been Rising” Campaign, “recognizing the long herstory of indigenous and women of color resisting gender based violence and modeling the transformative leadership and vision of young women of color.”

Andrea Smith has begun a list describing what a “justice-based movement to end gender violence” would look like in order to move us all “Beyond Eve Ensler,” and it includes things like this:

–          This movement would interrogate how the very category of “woman” has served as a tool of violence. It would examine how colonialism has operated by imposing a gender binary system in indigenous communities in order to facilitate the imposition of colonial heteropatriarchy.

–          This movement would recognize the state as a primary perpetrator of gender violence. Through chattel slavery, the sexual colonization of Indigenous women, the sexualized exploitation of immigrant workers, gender-based crimes in war, etc., the state has continually used and benefited from gender violence as a strategy to enforce white supremacy, imperialism and anti-Black racism.

–          This movement would recognize capitalism as inextricably linked to gender violence through the constant commodification of bodies, identities, lands, and resources.

–          The movement would recognize the central role of western imperialism in contributing to gender violence globally. It would thus stop presuming a simple solidarity with victims of violence in countries around the world without a critical examination of how people in Western countries benefit from the imperialism that helps shape conditions of gender violence globally.

This is a lot to understand when you’re a 19 year old student at a small Midwestern college. And yet this is what happens when you take a stand for justice on a stage or in a street or online: You become part of a larger discourse and are called to be accountable to a larger community of activists. It might not be easy. It is important.

My hope is that for the students who cross our stage and who enter our theatre, for whom this production really is a catalyst and a consciousness-raising experience, this is a beginning and not an ending. That it become the start of a learning process rather than the culmination of it.

Because it’s not just about breaking boundaries on stage and on campus, it’s about breaking up the structures and systems of oppression that seem to require it.

For more information on the 23rd Annual Women’s Memorial March for Missing and Murdered Women that Lauren Chief Elk mentioned, click here and here.

The Vagina Monologues

VDay

Previous Post

February 4, 2014

Black Masculinity & Oscar

Next Post

February 13, 2014 Dear Feminism, Let's Talk About Religion

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Abortion At the Intersections Atheism Christianity Contraception Education Feminism Gender Getting Theological Honorable Mention Islam LGBT News Our Voices Race Uncategorized

Select a Month July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

How was the land divided among the tribes of Israel?

Select your answer to see how you score.

By casting lots By family wealth By strength in battle By age