Helen Lewis' 'Difficult Women.' casts a cold eye on the feminism it chronicles. A cold, but open, realistic and human eye. The kind of eye that adds depth and understanding.
Lewis tells the stories of those women who have been written out of feminism history, women such as Erin Pizzey, founder of the charity Refuge, a service that has supported tens of thousands of women to escape violent homes. Admittedly Pizzey's current opinions are objectively distasteful, but is that a reason to ignore the good she has done? Lewis points to the lesbian feminists, whose stories are strangely absent, most likely willfully ignored. Women like Maureen Colquhoun, Jackie Foster and Babs Todd. Their contribution is not limited to gay rights or feminism, they have dragged our community towards greater kindness and civilization.
Lewis argues that contemporary feminism is afraid of complex stories and here she probably has a point. However, when she extends the explanation for this into the current moment she does what many commentators do and lays the blame on our so-called 'culture wars'. This is less compelling since it is not difficult to find evidence that the public square has rarely permitted nuance. Her central theme is deeply compelling that denying those who went before their complexity, neglects their contribution and takes from us a fuller, more real, more human story.
I loved Lewis' call for 'Structures, Structures, Structures!' Rights cannot rely on the platitudes of the powerful. If we are serious about rights they need to be enforceable. Our communities need to address imbalances of power with meaningful access to justice. This goes further than access to the courts, it is about the contexts and contingencies in our society.
She ends with 'A Manifesto for Difficult Women' this is magnificent and should be required reading for civic participation, or life.
Barbarism begins at home.
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