Opening the Third Eye

20 March 2003 Polish feminists often appear too eccentric and too revolutionary. To use a contemporary comparison, they are like modern-day versions of Frida Kahlo, the revolutionary Mexican painter and hero of a new, popular film.

Frida Kahlo, who is considered by many to be a pioneer of feminism, has entered into the popular consciousness. But not everyone is impressed. “I’ve read advertisements for the film: ‘An unfulfilled woman--because she was unhappy in love’ and I’m asking: how can anybody write such crap about an artist who revolutionized thinking about modern art?” says Kazimiera Szczuka, a Polish feminist.

Szczuka, a beautiful literature critic in her 30s, dreams about a revolution that would replace fossilized cultural ideals, bring individual truth for every woman, abolish the “happy slavery” in the patriarchal world, and level the playing field in career opportunities.

Women [in Poland] have less power, less money, and more difficulties in finding a job. The majority don’t seem to mind. Sociologists aren’t sure whether that is a result of a conscious acceptance of such inferiority or rather a lack of knowledge that the world is unfair.

Radical feminists are fighting, even though, in small towns, being a feminist is like being branded a witch. In larger cities feminism is marginal, but fashionable, a bit like vegetarianism, antiglobalism, clubbing or dreadlocks. It’s even more fashionable to say that you’re not a feminist. “She’s nice enough,” you might say, “and a brilliant painter, but what a pity she’s a feminist.”

“Sure, I’m a feminist,” says Izabela Jaruga-Nowacka, a Women’s Rights Ombudsman in the government and married with two daughters. “A feminist has the right to decide on her own life and stands against all types of discrimination according to sex, age, conviction, or sexual orientation.”

According to Beata Kozak, a Germanist, and the editor of the feminist magazine Zadra (“splinter”) a feminist is “someone who sees that there is no equality between the sexes and does everything they can to abolish those inequalities. She edits a newspaper or just brings up her child in an appropriate way. When speaking about women she does not stress the differences in sexes. Talking about the differences is a characteristic feature of the patriarchical model of culture.”

FORGET THE HIGH HEELS

Kinga Dunin, who is widely recognized as the embodiment of malicious feminist fierceness, writes: “What do you want from me, high heels? … No, I am not a feminist. I am a universalist. I believe in a universal human mind that cannot be reduced to the physiology of brain. ... The most important properties of the human mind are neither male nor female. I believe in a universal human culture that does not discriminate against either women’s creativeness or women’s experience. ... Yes, I am a feminist because the world I believe in does not exist yet.”

Like Dunin, Szczuka speaks openly about who she is because she thinks that the word “feminist” is mired in stereotypes and is almost damned. “There are many megawomen who … have achieved great success and say that, for sure, they are not feminists because equality has become a fact and there is no reason to riot.”

Feminism is by no means a uniform ideology. There is liberal feminism, anarchic feminism, Catholic feminism, conspiratorial-revolutionary feminism. Feminists have different opinions on women’s beauty (is it worth being beautiful?), on the content of the so-called women’s press (schizophrenic, but sometimes useful, or fit only for the garbage?), pornography (to prohibit or to introduce the same for women). For many people the bottom line--and often impassable stumbling block between feminism and non-feminism--is the attitude to abortion.

Revolution, too, is undoubtedly an issue. Some feminists are fighting an ongoing guerrilla war against inequality. Not long ago a new Warsaw radio station ran billboard adverts with a picture of a naked woman’s breast and the slogan: “It turns us on.” Eighteen women’s organizations sent a letter of protest to the Radio and Television Council. Society’s reaction was as predictable--“The aggression of those unsatisfied flappers is really horrible”--as it was modern and rational--“Maybe the billboard was too much, but what a thing to make such a noise about.” These were just a couple of comments from one internet discussion on the subject.

But what was the result of the protest? The billboards disappeared, the radio station is being monitored by the Radio and Television Council, and the marketing department of the radio probably saved a lot of money as, for several days, the name of the radio station was plastered on the front pages. The controversial billboards were replaced by new ones: “No girls allowed!”

Mr. P, a university lecturer whose daughter is at the forefront of the feminist movement, was horrified when she, then 20, left the father of her newly born son and gave up her university studies. He wasn’t very happy when he found out that his daughter’s friends were feminists although he calmed down when, thanks to them, she returned to university, got a diploma in Gender Studies and started her PhD. “I had already started thinking that my daughter wouldn’t do anything with her life,” Mr P. says.

Feminists are often seen as chilly and unpleasant people. Partly that’s because they’re reluctant to talk about their private lives, about their feelings, children, husbands or partners. “All deviations from the so-called norm, for instance living with a partner without getting married, living alone or with another woman are immediately used as arguments against feminism,” explains Joanna Piotrowska from the Information Center of the Women’s Circles. “These arguments confirm the stereotype that we’re all lesbians and that we can’t manage on our own in the non-feminist world.”

In one of the interviews Szczuka talks about her family. “I was brought up in a really hellish home. My mother worked hard as a doctor. She was very proficient but degraded as a woman. My father … kept me and my sisters thinking we were inferior and took no notice of our mother. Thus, for quite a while I idealized men. It was during a low … and I was sure that without hooking a man I would be nothing. So, I was acting as somebody’s girlfriend, and got myself into various destructive relationships before my sisters pulled me out. I got married and then divorced. I always dreamed about getting free from the burdens of housekeeping, to develop myself, to create, to write, to have or not have a partner.”

Joanna Piotrowska worked in the section devoted to social affairs in a daily newspaper. She was writing about battered women, hungry children and unemployed women. “I was professionally engaged with women activists and at the end of the day all the information began to turn into a more logical whole. All of a sudden my third eye was opened and I began to see all the inequalities.”

Joanna’s “third eye” continued to open. She saw how her parents had always tried to put her into a tight corset. They always “knew best” about how she was supposed to look, how to behave, what to feel, when to get married (because not getting married was out of the question), when to have a child. “It was because of my third eye that I quit writing, got involved in a women’s organization and found myself in an environment where I can be honest. My partner willingly wears feminist t-shirts but deeply in his heart he envies me.”

However, as rights ombudsman Jaruga-Nowacka admits, feminist consciousness often comes when a woman loses her job, is left by her husband and does not know what to do. “For years I’ve heard the same refrain: I’m 42 years old, I’m alone, I don’t have a career, I’ve just been bringing up kids. What can I do?”

Before the last parliamentary elections the Democratic Left Alliance and the Labor Union complied with an obligation that 30 percent of the electoral role must be women. However, female candidates were often put at the end of the roles and they lost. As a result, female fighters from the Self-Defense Party and the Polish Families League gained a victory [populist, conservative parties]. The recent local elections brought even greater disappointment. “There are no women in the party authorities,” complains the minister Jaruga-Nowacka. “Women were just treated as pre-election treats.”

On 8 March [International Women’s Day], Polish feminists took to the streets to protest against men’s domination. “Manifa” [manifestation] is a celebration of the 8 March. It reminds us that this day is not just a communist holiday with gilly-flowers and stockings, but an international day for fighting for human rights. “Manifa” has a growing number of female and male participants and, although it is fashionable, its slogans hardly correspond to everyday life.

“Working on society will be long and exhausting. The stereotypes are so strong,” says Bozena Uminska, a philosopher and gender studies lecturer, with a sigh. Her teenage son just came home from school with the information from a male biology teacher that the brain of a pregnant woman shrinks by up to 30 percent. It is still hard to be Frida here.

by Ewa Winnicka. Translated by Inessa Kim.

(C) Polityka 2003. Issue no. 10, 8 March.