Not Anonymous

I'll be doing a lot of marching this Friday, as it the annual Tel Aviv Pride Parade.

However, it's a little different this year.

The Gay Youth Club attack kind of put the community through the ringer and a whole lot of splits occurred and, well, there are two marches happening at the same time this year.

The annual one, dubbed the Municipal March because it's funded by the Tel-Aviv Municipality and is sponsored by the bigger, mainstream LGBT organisations.
At the same time, from a different location, the one dubbed the Community March (Officially called "Marching For Change") is marching as contrapuntal to the Municipal one, protesting the commercialisation and homogenisation of the march and all that.

I will, however, be marching in the first explicitly Radical Left Queer march. Which is actually happening before either of those marches and is getting more heat than either of the marches.

Because see, the Community March is about the murder and the fact that not enough was done after the attack and that the LGBT community in a way retreated and licked its wounds. These are things I agree with, but I don't agree that there should have been a split.

After the Radical March, I'll be joining up with the Municipal March and doing the regular route.
Why? Because I don't think a split in over-all community politics is the way to go.
The Radical March is deliberately separate because we want to talk about our marginalised position in the LGBT community.
The position that looks at Queer identity in Solidarity with other oppressed minorities in Israel.
This is something that has caused problems with the higher ups, Yaniv Weisman, who is a member of the Tel-Aviv Municipal Council and runs the Tel-Aviv LGBT Community Center has verbally attacked the existence of the Radical March, saying that we're using our Sexual Identities to promote a skewed version of the Community, that not everyone is "like them" (as in... like me).

I have to say. This is not what I was expecting.

In Israel, "Queer" doesn't have the pejorative history like in Anglophone countries, which is nice, and makes it easier to use as a word. But it is a word so intertwined with the Radical Left here, that it feels as though I have no safe space in the margins. I need to be even more marginal in order to be viewed as someone whose thoughts and feelings deserve to be expressed like a human being.

I'm quite ashamed to see groups pop up against our march calling themselves "Stop The Occupation of the March... by the Left".

The irony, it is physically painful for me. It angers me. It shows me that the LGBT community are fine with resting on their laurels while human rights are trampled elsewhere... so long as I'm "safe" everything is all right.

I'm not sure how people don't realise that the attack last year (fuck it's been 11 months!) was a symptom of the direction our society is going. No tolerance for the other, especially if they're visible.
That my own community be willing to silence voices in the name of National Unity, WTFF!!??, is something I don't want to contemplate too deeply.

I haven't updated, as I should have, regarding the flotilla ships and the fact that we have gone utterly bonkers, not that that's News.

But I'm exhausted. In about an hour I'm heading out to a demo, calling for the government to stop sinking us deeper and deeper into a position in which we will have no way out. Not that Netanyahu, Barak and Lieberman give a flying fuck about any demonstration calling for them to act like decent human beings.

That's fantasy land.

( Regarding those who died on board the ships and eyewitness accounts )

I have to say that I'm really sickened by the way the Israeli media machine and general public just lap up, no questions asked, everything that comes out of the IDF spokesman's office.

Like this video, from the IDF spokesman office, which recorded and uploaded the Israeli Navy's call to the Mavi Marmara:



If you go to time - 00:38, you will hear the following:

The Israeli government supports delivery of humanitarian supplies to the civilian population in the gaza strip and invites you to enter the Ashdod port. delivery of the supplies, in accordance with the authorities regulation, will be through the formal land crossings

The emphasised (by me) part is crucial, as it exposes the lie of that entire utterance.

"In accordance to the authorities regulation", that the only supplies that can be shipped into Gaza are the ones decided by Israel, meaning that everything on board that flotilla was banned - I've heard reports from the other day and yesterday that Hamas was rejecting the supplies brought into Israel via the flotilla, I don't know what that means, but that in no way absolves Israel's lie regarding the fact that they were planning on passing the supplies.

They never intended to, because in included the following "banned" material:
Sesame
Books
Chocolate
Clothes
Pomegranates
Preserved meat
Semolina
Butter
Kiwi
Cherries
Green Almonds
Shoes
Mattresses
Wheel Chairs
...Among other things. These are banned for "Security Reasons".
My peachy white ass.

The reason for this arbitrary list is pure interest and not security, "as such":

“If you go back two years, you see that it was utter foolishness,” says a senior officer who was serving in [Israeli Coordinator of Government Activities in the [Occupied] Territories] when the blockade was imposed. “There was a vague, unclear policy, influenced by the interests of certain groups, by this or that lobby, without any policy that derived from the needs of the population. For example, the fruit growers have a powerful lobby, and this lobby saw to it that on certain days, from 20-25 trucks full of fruit were brought into Gaza. It’s not that it arrived there and was thrown out, but if you were to ask a Gazan who lives there, it’s not exactly what he needs. What happened was that the Israeli interest took precedence over the needs of the populace.”

Don't tell me the siege is done in order to save Gilad Shalit or to stop the rockets from falling on Sderot. The Israeli Air Force flies over head and drops bombs all the time. In the went bank non-violent demonstrations against the Occupation turn violent because Soldiers fire tear gas grenade launches straight into the crowds and rubber bullets are actual bullets wrapped in rubber. All those "non-lethal" weapons have killed.

( Regarding Israeli political fallout )

The focus of the media on the activists violence in self-defence is completely disproportional to the violence committed by the soldiers, by orders of their superior officers, of the ministry of love defence and of the Prime Minister's office.
I could go on.

This was not about defending Israel. This was not about Gilad Shalit.

While everyone is talking about Israel's image, I'm far more concerned about its character and my own.

But Israel just wants to save its face, never mind that it's showing its ass.

Bah! I got this a week or so ago from Joy hirself, I hope I'm not too late!

Palestine Solidarity Activist and Blogger Joy in Palestine is writing a graphic novel about hir experiences in the village of at-Tuwani in the West Bank.

The project is called at-Tuwani, a Graphic Novel

All the information is available at the website linked above, but under the cut I've put all the info you need to know about Joy and how to donate to help hir cause: ( Cut for Length )

Please spread the word along!

It was actually "Hoomin Rongs, Ur Doin it Right".

That's what happens when a bunch of geeks who have just come from a Human Rights March and speak fluent LOLcat say to each other.

Yesterday was a busy day.

On the day of Israel's first Human Rights March; 21 activists were arrested in East Jerusalem for demonstrating against the eviction of Arab families in the Sheik Jarrah neighbourhood and bringing in Jewish families in their stead; Settlers vandalised a Mosque in the West Bank village of Yasuf, burning Korans and spraying graffiti to prayer rugs.

Just to contextualise the day for y'all.

My day was much better.

I got up early-ish in order to get to Tel-Aviv by 11 AM because that's when all the people were supposed to be gathering at Rabin square.
At first there were no contingencies I knew or felt a part of were there, so I was all awkward and just standing there.
Luckily a friend - who for the sake of this post I'll call "Phill" - arrived and he was also very surprised that our contingencies were lacking.

Then at around a quarter past 11 I suddenly saw multiple rainbow flags which made me happy, but they went to stand next to Meretz¹, the Party I felt utterly and completely sold out their voters in order to widen their base and get more supporters.

Yes, we're all very factional... well, at least I am.

Then a few minutes later more friends of mine from campus arrived along with the red flags, yep, I stuck around in my "This is what a feminist looks like" tank top, my Keffiya and picked up a red flag!
( This is where I ruminate on boring Leftists - sorta - party politics in Israel )

At around half past a friend with whom I hang out with at Uni - we'll call him "Jon" - arrived and I was so happy to discover that he brought his Pride Flag with him!
Some ass told him to not wave it around because there were other contingencies (that Hadash might not identify with) were also waving around rainbow flags.
"Jon" looked at him as though he's grown another head.
I snorted loudly.

It so happened that I ended up carrying the Pride flag because "Jon" ended up carrying a huge banner with another person and I handed the red flag I'd been carrying to a future Member of the Party (some eight year old kid, I'd say) and "Jon" and I ended up marching the whole way together.

Someone brought a solar powered boom-box and there was music in the streets!

Well you know what's attributed to Emma Goldman, right? A Revolution without dancing and a Revolution not worth having!, or rather: If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution.
Same-Same...

We finally got to the plaza outside the Tel-Aviv Museum - which right across the street from the IDF HQ (I laughed, it's just too sad) and there were huge amounts of people that joined for the speeches.
It was vast.

( About boring speeches and being moved by them )

Then there was music, more speeches, even more music, I found some geek friends, we ate doughnuts because it is Hannukah and we began to LOLcat.

( Footnotes )

I am in the opinion that Patriarchy and its siblings Heteronormativity and White supremacy are the roots of evil in our times.

Just in case any of you had any doubt about that.

I just came back from the "Stop Violence Against Women" march and it was good.
We were not that many, because this is a chauvinist country.
The speeches after were very inspiring.

I and a few others then went to get some supper at a pizza place. There was a whole lot of talk about political theory, uni studies, feminism etc.

In the end there appeared to be some kind of combat between neo-Marxist thought and Post-Modernism (of which there was a gross misunderstanding). It was very Bubbly in the sense that "we are living in a bubble", which I'm cool with seeing as us "bubble people" actually went to the march in order to raise awareness that violence against women - it happens, it's societal disease and it needs to be stopped.

There was also talk about Politically Correctness, a term and though process I abhor and how, even as an ally, I really shouldn't use words that do not belong to me. Call me old-fashioned.

Also, there's really no shame in admitting you're bourgeoisie if you, ya know, living that lifestyle. My politics are radical, but my life is liberal, that's the way it is, why should I hide it or be ashamed of it?

One of the girls we sat with had to catch the same bus as me and we continued to talk and oh my god it was awful.
Just so you know, she irritated me.
A lot.

I have a button (I have many) on my bag that reads "Sex is the Question - sex is not the answer - "Yes" is the Answer" (yes I know it's a play on the Nickleback lyrics) which to me is a sex-positive slogan akin to "Yes is Yes" which is just as valid as "No is No".
Anyway, this girl asked me about it and I told her the above and she said:
"You need to be careful with that term [pro-sex], it can be taken to mean you're pro prostitution and stuff like that"
I replied: "Well, I am pro-sex work and pro-porn"
And OMG!
I had never heard such cookie cutter Second Wave Paternalistic bullshit come out of someone younger than me - pardon the ageism, but that's impressive in a horrifying way!
I tried to say that sex-work isn't just human trafficking and crack whores and pimped women.
Her reply: It's all False Conciousness.
In my head I'm going - OMG!
I say: There's queer and alt porn.
She goes: It reproduces the same oppressive mechanism as mainstream porn. It's the same objectification.
I say: There's BDSM that enables you to play with the oppressive power structure and have a good time at the same time.
She goes: BDSM reproduces the power structure, why would you want to do something that humiliates you?

I wanted to kill her and myself.

I really couldn't talk to her any more, because really, it showed such a lack of understanding of what a power structure actually is, that hierarchy is a daily and hourly thing we live and work with our entire lives and that kink does not mean there isn't an actual partnership or that an unequal partnership automatically means there isn't consent!

Because that's what bothers me the most about the Dworkin and MacKinnon types - I really like the way they theorised Patriarchy and Phallocentrism, the tools they offer are awesome, also MacKinno is a brilliant speaker - but if you take their entire thesis you end up saying: women have no ability to consent in the system that we currently live, because there's nothing but False Conciousness.

Yeah, no thanks.

Today, at the weekly protest in the village on Nialin, demonstrators broke down a section of the wall:


( More under the cut )

That is so amazing and encouraging, the significance of it being so close to the date of the fall of the Berlin wall is just... poetic.

The Lambda Literary Foundation, for those of you who do not know, is an American LGBT Literary that works to raise the status of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender authors, who are marginalised, in the literary world.

Awesome says I.

An organisation that works to elevate the visibility and merit of LGBT(Q!) authors is good.

The Lambda Awards (hereby known as the Lammy's) though, are about the stories. Or at least, that's what I (and probably many others) thought.

However, the new guidlines contain within them a new rule, which is a source of contention:

The Lambda Literary Foundation (LLF) seeks to elevate the status of openly gay, lesbian, bisexual and trans (LGBT) people throughout society by rewarding and promoting excellence among LGBT writers who use their work to explore LGBT lives.

As such, it should be noted that the Lambda Literary Awards are based principally on the LGBT content, the gender orientation/identity of the author, and the literary merit of the work.

Let's get one thing straight (laugh it up); queers having our own space, our own awards and our own rules as to who applies, is not a bad thing.
Really, it's not.
The problem is, who decides.

The Lammy's guideline specifically states:

As to what defines LGBT? That is not up to anyone at Lambda Literary Foundation to decide. The writers and publishers are the ones who will be doing the self-identifying. Sexuality today is fluid and we welcome and cherish this freedom. We take the nomination of any book at face value: if the book is nominated as LGBT, then the author is self-identifying as part of our LGBT family of writers, and that is all that is required. There are many permutations of LGBT and they're all welcome as that LGBT term we've all adopted makes clear.

Okay, so they accept anyone who ID's as part of the LGBT(Q damnit!) family. And if that bisexual cis woman who is married to her straight cis male husband of such-and-such years submits an award. Sure, of course she's eligible.
But wait, no she doesn't, she doesn't live the "lifestyle".
An exaggeration?
Not so much, when that kind of thing happens all the time, you're not queer enough if you have het privilege.
Is it stupid? Of course it is, but whoever said marginalised groups were good with the whole acceptance thing.

Honestly, I don't think it would go that way, I'm also obviously being satirical here. I mean, it could, but I'm trying for optimism here. LGBT(Q) authors having their place and awarding those of us who wrote a story in which our portrayal brings us and the characters in the story alive is a very good thing.
Telling people that who they are may not be enough in order to be eligible for the award is not the way to go.

The main problem that came out of this whole thing is that the change in the guidelines came with such short notice.
The notice of the change came out September 25th, submission begins October 1st and ends December 1st.
Yeah, no matter how you look, that is short notice, especially when it's effective immediately.

I say my opinion is fuzzy, the "litmus" should be for people to be able to say:"I'm queer", accept that statement at face value and move on in order to read a good book or story about people who are like me (potentially). But queer isn't a visible thing, our statements of who we are, are under constant attack because we are marginalised, because we are not "normal", because if we really wanted to and tried hard enough, we wouldn't have to be marginalised, now would we.

I'm getting frustrated from all this thinking about which box we're supposed to fit into. Sexuality is fluid (not for everyone!), but it better remain in that little bowl.

Regardless of how us queers feel about the change in the guidelines, which is not clear cut at all, here is one thing I have to say about those straight authors, who are yelling at the Interwebs, about being marginalised because the Lammy's changed the rules on their gay romance.

Shut up.

No, really. Shut. The. Fuck. Up.

I've had it up to fucking here with stupid straight people appropriating my space, in order to promote an agenda that has nothing to do with actually being queer, and has everything to do with "but I want to play in this sandbox too".
Yes, well, at the moment you are peeing in it, because the attitude of entitlement is not the one members of the LGBTQ family who happen to be cis and straight should be throwing around.
You feel strongly about your portrayal of gay characters, that's good, I feel strongly about it to.
Saying that because you feel excluded from a prize, you are oppressed is irksome, irritating and shows that you are so privilege blind that you really have no fucking clue what homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, etc actually causes the psyche of a person who does deal with these prejudices and hates on a bloody daily basis.

God, am I the only one who had a flashback to the trek stupidity a couple months back.
Seriously, peeps, what the fuck?!

On that, I'm not so fuzzy headed.

A thanks to rm, kynn and vashtan; their posts really enabled me write this post in a (hopefully) semi-coherent way.
Their own opinions and fact finding skills were extremely helpful.

Reply to this meme by yelling "Words!".
I will then give you five words that remind me of you.
Then post them in your LJ and explain what they mean to you.

These are the words whereisjoy gave me:
( Gender Studies )

( Israel )

( Activism )

( Torchwood )

( Fangirl )
So, yeah.

Every country and nation has little moments in which you proclaim "Only in [name of country]!".

I came upon a moment like that yesterday on my home on my regular mode of public transportation. Now, lots of things make me go "Only in Israel", but this incident was seriously unique.

I'm sitting and a few rows in the back I hear a guy speak to his buddy on his cellphone. He was crystal clear and I couldn't miss a word.
Here is what he said, translated from Hebrew to English for your benefit:

"Hey man [other person on the phone], I saw Waltz with Bashir last night. And guess what, one of the soldiers that was interviewed was my Commanding Officer when I was in the Army.

My eyes fell out of my face.
He continued:

The movie doesn't make us look good. But it was powerful and seeing my CO there got me to be even more connected

This country is seriously small and screwed up.

It's an interesting coincidence that on the same day that I had this Overheard on Israeli public transport that the social activism channel Social TV (YouTube Channel) broadcast the second edition of their magazine In an Occupying Society, which is a ten minute podcast of interviews in which Left, anti-Occupation, Feminist, etc activists talk about the Occupation from various perspectives, from the Israeli side, in an attempt to raise awareness as to what the Occupation is costing Israeli society.

This month's edition is about Militarism and it connects so well with what I overheard on the train.
The video is in Hebrew with English subtitles.


Last month's edition was the economic cost of the Occupation: Part 1 and Part 2.

I've always been a bit of a floater when it came to Activism - it has to do that I haven't actually been politically active for that long - I've mainly been active at the Uni and participated in a few things in which I didn't particularly feel I needed to actually be affiliated.

Well, since the operation on Gaza and the marginalization of the Left in these here parts I've felt the need to find a place in which I could be active and have a firm support network.

This past Sunday a general meeting of Hadash - the Party I voted for if you recall - the agenda of which was the establishment of a New Left. Of course, it was more about the broadening of the message Hadash always spoke, but because they aren't "Zionist" have been marginalised.

Thank you human ingenuity for the Interwebs.

Anyway, Hadash (al-Jabha in Arabic) is an acronym for The Democratic Front for Peace and Equality. Like many Leftist organizations, fronts and movements, it is kind of taken for granted that women are included, that women have something to say.
And on Sunday, at the general meeting, every single one of the women who spoke to the large assembly of over 300 people, said that there is not enough women representation.

So this morning, the first meeting of what may turn into the Hadash Feminist Forum met up. It was really interesting, 'cause there were a few older Hadash members, including former (and legendary) MK Tamar Gozansky and a whole lot of newbies like Moi.

I won't get into the whole meeting as minutes were taken and I actually don't remember everything that was said.
I added my own 0.2 about queer women and their position in the Left and society as whole, because we kept talking about women of colour (Jewish and Arab), working class women, mothers etc.
I felt good about at least raising the issue

What really bugged me though, was when an Anarchist man ( had some things to say - cut for going off tangent )

It was a productive meeting and we've already arranged to meet other women's movements that are part of the Front and will most likely start getting things done for International Woman Day - 8th of March FYI.

I'm hoping to find an activism base here, because I'd really like to strengthen the parliamentarian Left in these coming months because of blow it took in these election.
Bibi is Prime Minister.
What is the Agnostic/Atheist cry for help and hope and despair?
Oh, the Humanity!