Toban Black

A post that I put together for the Waging Nonviolence web site -
“An invitation from the Mobilization for Climate Justice coalition”

This post introduces the U.S.-based Mobilization for Climate Justice, as well as similar critiques and activism associated with that Climate Justice coalition. As I indicate, the organizers in and around that coalition also address a range of energy & carbon issues (including tar sands pollution, and biofuel land grabs) — along with interrelated and more apparent global warming concerns. Their approach to these ecological issues is based on prior environmental justice critiques and activism, as well as wider opposition towards corporations, and other international market structures.

Climate Justice Action is another “climate justice” coalition. They seem to be a lot more connected with countries outside of North America — whereas The Mobilization for Climate Justice is very U.S.-based.

The phrase “climate justice” also is used by various other people — some of whom probably wouldn’t know anything about Climate Justice Action or the Mobilization for Climate Justice. The concept of climate justice was around for years before those two coalitions were formed, so the phrase has wider traction. Of course, the actual uses of that term are somewhat inconsistent; there is no absolute consensus about what ‘climate justice’ is.

A post that I put together for the Waging Nonviolence blog -
“Glimpsing a history of anti-nuclear activism”

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Below, there is some more writing that adds to that piece.   First, here are some remarks about the Waging Nonviolence post -

That post revolves around a monument which is dedicated to women in a campaign against nuclear cruise missiles at a military base in the UK (at the Greenham Common, in Berkshire). I’ve provided some background and context — while highlighting a history of wider campaigns.

The nuclear issues foregrounded in the title actually are just part of the post; feminism, anti-militarism, and ecology all are raised in there as well.

There also is a little writing about me. One of the editors suggested that I should write about my personal experiences at the monument site. I mainly wrote myself in there like that to convey what it is like to see the monument. Basically, I’ve communicated what it’s like to see it without a grasp of the inside references there. It’s more likely that the monument would resonate with people from the UK, but there must be a lot of people over there who don’t know anything about the Greenham Common networks and peace camp.

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“These streets are mine too!”

Those words are part of a Take Back the Night march sign
(which Anna Overseas posted on Flickr)

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April Streeter (in this blog post) -
“Even in bike-crazy Portland, the stats have showed an approximate split of 70% male riders versus 30% female riders. In Paris, there’s a similar split, says mobility consultant Eric Britton. The numbers are even more skewed in other places.”

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Anna Letitia Mumford on her fifty car pile-up blog -
“A rant from the second wave (but seriously folks, we have a gender problem)”

(I agree that we should find ways to make bicycling attractive, but I also think that we should challenge mainstream standards of sexiness and beauty (like waifish models of femininity); I’ll elaborate on that point below.)

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Dominick Tao (in this journalistic blog post) -
“As a whole, men in the U.S. make three times as many trips by bicycle than women, according to research [pdf] by John Pucher, a professor of urban planning.”

“The numbers are actually worse in New York, where only 21 percent of trips by bicycle are made by women. According to a voluntary survey by members of the New York Cycle Club, the largest organization of its kind in the city, only about a third of the club’s members said they are female.”

“With the exception of areas [of New York] like Central Park and designated bike trails — which female cyclists populate almost as zealously as their male counterparts) — bike riding in most parts of the city is hardly leisurely. ‘It’s like going into battle,’ Mr. Pucher said. ‘You need a helmet and gloves.’”

“Indeed, a ride through Midtown during the rush often means dodging trucks and speeding taxis, weaving through flocks of ear-budded pedestrians, swerving around gouged asphalt, and rocketing across intersections when the traffic signal does not say go.’

Mr. Pucher said to make cycling more appealing to women, and children and the elderly, for that matter, cycling in the city needs to be safer.”

In other words, our streets needn’t be macho battlegrounds.

(Mr. Tao also stresses fashion issues in his post.)

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“You can’t be sexy without consuming.”
- Julie (in this Feministe blog post)

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In London, England

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Three posts from Lisa on the Sociological Images blog -
- “The Economics of Beauty”
- “Sexualization and Adultification of Young Children of Color”
- “The Beauty Industry: Spending And Routines”

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(Photo by Orin Optiglot)

In Melbourne, Australia

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Three photos from the local university campus — with written remarks about them -

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These four blog posts are about those photos  -
- Sociological Images - “Defending privilege”
- Feministe - “Anti-Feminist Vandalism”
- The F-Word - “Real men and rape”
- Feministing - “Fun with Feminist Flickr (activism edition)”

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More bike lifting (or “Chicago hold-up“) photos -

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A few blog posts about how the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) degrades women during their campaigns– in part, by presenting women as sex objects.

• gwen at Sociological Images
• Holly Richmond at Gristmill
• Ann at Feministing

There are a lot of links and images at those blog pages.

Dave Hill in The Guardian - “Gender stereotypes hurt men too” [via Feministing]

Selected exerpts -

“The best and wisest feminist ideals – the sort that don’t interest the media - have things to offer men too.”

“The state of maleness carries its own burden of expectations and constraints. Contemporary studies of boyhood shed light on what we’ve always known – what I still remember vividly from my own boyhood – about the disabling and limiting influence of male behaviour conventions, homophobia and general ‘gender policing’ on men in the making and the huge anxieties that inform them.

This is the baggage men drag with them through their lives; the pressure imposed both from without and from within to appear hard and never soft, to make a performance of rejecting anything that smacks of domesticity or femininity, notwithstanding the metrosexual and ‘new man’. Even men who seem to embody and thrive on this stereotype can feel like slaves to it, and are often undone by it.

Sensible, grown up, non-sectarian feminism recognises all of this and seeks ways for men to combat it.” Among other things, it’s “about men flourishing and developing in all areas of their lives, including as parents and in the home.”

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A related post at Red Jenny’s blog -
“Masculine, Feminine, or Human?”
I left a comment there as well.

This writing from me touches on those sorts of gender issues -
“Remaking gender – Beyond women’s lives“

A blog post from Jenny - “Too Many People?”

Jenny addresses how population growth and associated environmental consequences are interconnected with other issues — particularly social injustices.

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Related statements from Johann Hari about overpopulation -

“After studying the evidence, I am left in a position I didn’t expect. Yes, the argument about overpopulation is distasteful, often discussed inappropriately, and far from being a panacea-solution — but it can’t be dismissed entirely. It will be easier for 6 billion people to cope on a heaving, boiling planet than for nine or 10 billion — and we will only get there by freeing women to make their own reproductive choices. To achieve this green goal, it’s necessary to mix some oestrogen into the environmentalist palette.”

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Far too often, critical responses to prevailing gender arrangements have entailed a narrow focus on women. Efforts to bring about female freedom and empowerment generally have only consisted of responses to women’s lives and opportunities for women. These women-only approaches are inadequate. We cannot effectively support women with these narrow strategies and perspectives, which also have prevented us from bringing about gender arrangements that would better suit the vast majority of humanity—including women.

To pursue these greater opportunities we must set our sights beyond the lives of women (and thus beyond the approach which generally has been encouraged through uses of the term “feminism”); we must also challenge prevailing masculinity—including traditional masculine aggression and callousness, as well as traditionally masculine pretensions to omniscience. While challenging these and other prevailing masculine behaviours—by confronting traditionally masculine men as well as traditionally masculine women—we must oppose this masculinity in capitalism, in bureaucracies, in militarism, and in industrialism, as well as other areas of societies that are saturated with traditional masculinity. Such greater goals and projects would better serve women, men, and everyone else. All of us live under the violence, exploitation, and authoritarian designs of traditional masculinity.

Of course, women are—and long have been—far more oppressed. On the whole, men certainly do have more power. Yet, opposition to these injustices usually has been limited to a divisive rallying of women against men—an approach that has not and will not receive significant male support. Many women also will continue to refuse to segregate themselves in this woman-centred camp. A sub-set of females—with the occasional male supporter—cannot dramatically remake gender arrangements on their own. Nevertheless, critical responses to standard gender positions and inter-relationships usually have consisted of these antagonistic conflicts between women and men. While some female unity and some attention to women’s lives certainly will be necessary to effectively challenge male predominance, significant gender transformations only will be reached through female-male unity—in the pursuit of shared visions and values. Everyone must be drawn toward more desirable and fulfilling forms of gender. Thus, while we address women’s lives, our interventions in gender arrangements also must include critical responses to traditional masculinity.

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I’ll be extending and revising this piece and then re-posting it. Any comments posted here will be taken into account as I’m editing what I’ve written above.

The above writing was published in the August 2008 issue of The F-Word.