Monday, September 3, 2018: Rahila Gupta and Lucy Jane Bledsoe on Paradises Built in Hell

Today's show was originally aired on May 7. Enjoy this replay from KPFA Women's Magazine:

Rebecca Solnit's 2010 book A Paradise Built in Hell posits that disasters, whether natural or human created, commonly bring out our most generous and cooperative nature, leading to the development of new forms of community and democratic organization. This week on Women's Magazine, I talk with two women who have done their own research into this phenomenon.

British journalist Rahila Gupta traveled to Northern Syria to witness the grassroots feminist democracy being built in territory liberated from the Islamic State. She has written extensively about the impressive network of women's cooperatives, political education and legislative accomplishments built in just a few years.

Lucy Jane Bledsoe's new novel, The Evolution of Love, imagines the aftermath of a massive earthquake in the East Bay, and suggests that our bonobo nature, favoring love and cooperation over conflict and competition, might ultimately triumph. Bledsoe is the award-winning author of A Thin Bright Line, which has just been optioned for a film.

Click here to listen to the show. 59:50 min

Interview blogs from May 7:
Rahila Gupta
Lucy Jane Bledsoe

Events:
Film showing:
Good Morning Pakistan by Dr. Hazan Zee
SAN FRANCISCO EXCLUSIVE ENGAGEMENT September 6 and 13

NOW PLAYING - 4 Star Theatre SF- BUY YOUR TICKETS https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/3593009

RISE FOR CLIMATE, JOBS AND JUSTICE MARCH

SEPTEMBER 8TH
Look for the queer and women contingents. Meet at 10:30 AM at 101 California for the queer contingent and at 10 AM on Stuart between Market and Mission for the women's contingent.

Monday, August 27, 2018: Author Bonnie Morris and new book Gender at Work

First up we listen to a talk given at Laurel Books by lesbian feminist author and scholar Bonnie Morris about her new book The Feminist Revolution, a richly illustrated, engagingly written history of second-wave feminism and successor movements from the 1960s to the present. Lisa Dettmer is the host of today's show.

Then in the second half of the show Preeti Mangala Shekar talks to Aruna Rao, Joanne Sandler, David Kelleher and Carol Miller, authors of the new book “Gender at work: Theory and Practice for 21st Century Organizations” a book that looks at the deeper structures that create and reinforce gender inequality.

Click here to listen now. 59:50 min

Monday, May 7, 2018: Rahila Gupta on Paradises Built in Hell

Rebecca Solnit's 2010 book A Paradise Built in Hell posits that disasters, whether natural or human created, commonly bring out our most generous and cooperative nature, leading to the development of new forms of community and democratic organization. This week on Women's Magazine, Kate Raphael talks with two women who have done their own research into this phenomenon. First we hear from Rahila Gupta.

British journalist Rahila Gupta traveled to Northern Syria to witness the grassroots feminist democracy being built in territory liberated from the Islamic State. She has written extensively about the impressive network of women's cooperatives, political education and legislative accomplishments built in just a few years.

Rojava is broken into three cantons. Afrin Canton in the West, Kobane Canton in the center, and Cizre Canton in the East. These three cantons are working in cooperation with many local and international players to push back the Islamic State.

Click here to listen to the show. 59:50 min

Also on today's show:
Lucy Jane Bledsoe

Monday, April 20, 2015: Chinese feminist Feng Yuan on the Feminist Five

We speak with Chinese feminist Feng Yuan about the arrest and release of the Feminist Five – five young feminists held for over a month for planning International Women’s Day actions around the country.They are Li Tingting, age 25; Zheng Churan, age 25; Wei Tingting, age 26; Wu Rongrong, age 30; and Wang Man, age 33.The activists had begun their advocacy work on Valentine’s Day in 2012, when Li and Wei walked along a busy Beijing commercial area in wedding gowns stained with fake blood to attract attention. They chanted slogans like “Hitting is not intimacy; verbal abuse is not love.” They also distributed anti-domestic ­violence pamphlets and cards to passers­by. Many of the bystanders were sympathetic to their message and complimented them on their bravery.

Listen now or Get MP3. 9:02 min






Soon after the “wounded brides” stunt, young feminist activists organized another attention-grabbing event, called “occupy the men’s room.” The Occupy Wall Street movement had inspired Li to design an activist project in Guangzhou together with Wang, Zheng, and others. They encouraged women waiting in long lines outside restrooms to “occupy” the less-used men’s rooms for 10 minutes, then return the stalls to men after the number of women waiting had been reduced. They called for an increase in the size of women’s public restrooms that would equalize wait times for men and women.

The monthlong ordeal of the Feminist Five began around 11 p.m. on March 6, when police in Beijing and the southern city of Guangzhou knocked on the respective doors of Zheng and Li, almost at the exact same moment. In Guangzhou, they held Zheng in a hotel room. In Beijing, police searched Li’s apartment. According to Li’s live-in girlfriend Xiaola (who asked to use a pseudonym), the police felt they had a “gotcha” moment when they found stickers that Li had prepared to use at an anti-sexual harassment rally on March 7, just ahead of International Women’s Day, which falls on March 8 of every year. They subsequently took Li and Xiaola to the police station for interrogation.

The “March 7 Stick-In” was a project Zheng and Li had worked on together; they had planned to distribute the stickers on buses to combat sexual harassment. They had recruited volunteers from different cities through social media platforms.

The Five Feminist were released on bail on April 13 and are still under watch by various authorities.

Click here to listen to the entire show. 59:50 min.

Also on today's show:
COMPAÑERAS: Zapatista Women
SF International Film Festival

Monday, March 9, 2015: What it Means to be a Woman: Trans VS Feminism

KPFA Women's Magazine Discusses Creating Space for Black Lesbians and the Complexities of Butch Identity and TransGender

Standing together for All Womyn at MichFest

In the last year the issue of conflicts between the transgender and radical feminist community has become front page news, as Mt Holyoke cancels the Vagina  Monologues because of its lack of presentation of trans voices and the Michigan Women's Music festival boycott becomes supported by high profile women musicians and LGBT organizations for its policies on trans people.

Lisa Dettmer talks to  poet, scholar and black trans activist Kai M. Green and Poet, playwright and Black Lesbian Activist Pipa Fleming about the definition of woman and the conflicts between the trans community and radical feminists.

Click here to listen to the show. 59:50 min.

Also on today's show:
Antisemitism in France

Monday, January 12, 2014: Remembering Maha Abu Dayyeh

Remembering Maha Abu Dayyeh (24 August 1951 – 9 January 2015)

MAHA ABU-DAYYEH, GENERAL DIRECTOR

"We don’t have the luxury of despair, in times of crises we must provide hope and leadership whilst inspiring the next generation of young women."

We honor the life and legacy of Maha Abu Dayyeh, co-founder and director of the Women's Center for Legal Aid and Counseling in Jerusalem, one of the leading Palestinian women's rights organizations. She died on January 9. We're joined by Jessica Neuwirth, director of Donor Direct Action.

Listen now or Get MP3.







Maha was a visionary leader and an untiring servant of the Palestinian women’s movement. She began her human rights work as a staff member at the Quaker Center for Legal Aid for Palestinian political prisoners from the late-1980s into the early-1990s. While there, she began to recognise the specific needs of Palestinian women. Thus, in 1991, with several other Palestinian women, Maha co-founded the Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counselling in Jerusalem, now a leading women’s rights organisation dedicated to developing a democratic Palestinian society based on the principles of gender equality, social justice, and human rights.

Maha’s remarkable life is distinguished by her achievements as a Palestinian feminist human-rights activist, leader, and thinker and by her integrity, perseverance, and unrelenting commitment to promoting women’s human rights locally and internationally. She also understood the critical importance of providing quality legal aid, social counselling, and protection services to women in an environment where their rights are denied and abused and their interests overlooked, alongside the struggle to create institutional change in the wider society.

A memorial for Maha has been set up by her family at Donor Direct Action. To contribute to Maha's memory go to www.donordirectaction.org/WCLAC.

Also on today's show:

Islamophobia

Community Rights

Click here to listen to entire show. 59:50 min.