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| Pardons for the suffragettes? What a cheap, patronising cover-up | Pardons for the suffragettes? What a cheap, patronising cover-up |
| (about 21 hours later) | |
| The Scottish Tories and the ragingly brocialist club that is the Labour party have called for a readjustment of the suffragettes’ legacy, with pardons for women convicted of arson and vandalism. What a whitewash. What a cover-up. What a cheap and easy move, conferring a gloss of feministic sanctity over any political leader who makes this happen, while requiring minimum effort and ignoring the many challenges that women still face in our fight for emancipation from abuse, violation, harassment, discrimination and exploitation today. | The Scottish Tories and the ragingly brocialist club that is the Labour party have called for a readjustment of the suffragettes’ legacy, with pardons for women convicted of arson and vandalism. What a whitewash. What a cover-up. What a cheap and easy move, conferring a gloss of feministic sanctity over any political leader who makes this happen, while requiring minimum effort and ignoring the many challenges that women still face in our fight for emancipation from abuse, violation, harassment, discrimination and exploitation today. |
| To wipe away these convictions is to wipe clean any sign of what was done to these women and how disproportionately and violently they were punished for disorderly conduct, setting small fires and breaking some windows – after many years of patiently, reasonably, nicely arguing for women’s inclusion in the political system, and being ignored. | To wipe away these convictions is to wipe clean any sign of what was done to these women and how disproportionately and violently they were punished for disorderly conduct, setting small fires and breaking some windows – after many years of patiently, reasonably, nicely arguing for women’s inclusion in the political system, and being ignored. |
| It would be one thing if over the past 100 years the women who fought for the vote had been stigmatised, ridiculed and belittled as a result of their criminalisation. But the narrative went the other way, the correct way: the women were, and are, seen as freedom fighters who were made the victims of an aggressive and perversely violent “justice” system in which male police officers, detectives and judges cared less about considering the principles at stake than preserving male power, punishing female unruliness (often with outright violence and revolting, rape-symbolic violations such as force-feeding) and demolishing female solidarity. | It would be one thing if over the past 100 years the women who fought for the vote had been stigmatised, ridiculed and belittled as a result of their criminalisation. But the narrative went the other way, the correct way: the women were, and are, seen as freedom fighters who were made the victims of an aggressive and perversely violent “justice” system in which male police officers, detectives and judges cared less about considering the principles at stake than preserving male power, punishing female unruliness (often with outright violence and revolting, rape-symbolic violations such as force-feeding) and demolishing female solidarity. |
| The women’s convictions stand as clear signs of what they were up against; the women themselves aren’t somehow shamed or degraded by the charges, which reflect the authorities’ attitudes at the time. The women were rebels, knew what they were risking and didn’t care about their reputation. Being pardoned would be a patronising pat on the head, a perverse “forgiveness” by a conformist society that has always punished women who speak out and act out. Even today, a woman who refuses to internalise abuse and makes a report against a man who has violated her – or a small business that has sacked her for getting pregnant, or a revered corporation that pays her less than her male counterparts – can expect to be disbelieved, isolated, blamed and punished for speaking her truth. | The women’s convictions stand as clear signs of what they were up against; the women themselves aren’t somehow shamed or degraded by the charges, which reflect the authorities’ attitudes at the time. The women were rebels, knew what they were risking and didn’t care about their reputation. Being pardoned would be a patronising pat on the head, a perverse “forgiveness” by a conformist society that has always punished women who speak out and act out. Even today, a woman who refuses to internalise abuse and makes a report against a man who has violated her – or a small business that has sacked her for getting pregnant, or a revered corporation that pays her less than her male counterparts – can expect to be disbelieved, isolated, blamed and punished for speaking her truth. |
| To wipe away convictions is to wipe clean any sign of what was done to these women and how violently they were punished | To wipe away convictions is to wipe clean any sign of what was done to these women and how violently they were punished |
| The work of the suffragettes is not yet done. The fight for the vote was symbolic as well as practical: the vote represented women’s inclusion in political and public life, our acceptance as equal citizens – and not just as silent providers of childcare, food, cleaning services, emotional comfort, drudge work and sexual labour. It was a bid to be seen and accepted as human beings, not as objects to be raped and worked to death. It was an act of public ambition, not just a chance to tick a box next to a male politician’s name at election time. | The work of the suffragettes is not yet done. The fight for the vote was symbolic as well as practical: the vote represented women’s inclusion in political and public life, our acceptance as equal citizens – and not just as silent providers of childcare, food, cleaning services, emotional comfort, drudge work and sexual labour. It was a bid to be seen and accepted as human beings, not as objects to be raped and worked to death. It was an act of public ambition, not just a chance to tick a box next to a male politician’s name at election time. |
| Look how far we have not come. Look at how women in public life are treated: the mockery, the double standards, the discrimination, the scathing misogyny, the male cronyism. Look at how women are treated by men on the streets, on public transport, in beds, in darkened rooms, in the back office. The #MeToo movement is itself a reprise of the consciousness-raising of 1970s radical feminism. It is nothing that Andrea Dworkin, Catharine MacKinnon and Susan Brownmiller have not already said. | Look how far we have not come. Look at how women in public life are treated: the mockery, the double standards, the discrimination, the scathing misogyny, the male cronyism. Look at how women are treated by men on the streets, on public transport, in beds, in darkened rooms, in the back office. The #MeToo movement is itself a reprise of the consciousness-raising of 1970s radical feminism. It is nothing that Andrea Dworkin, Catharine MacKinnon and Susan Brownmiller have not already said. |
| Cuts to essential public services have put rape crisis services, domestic violence shelters and family support projects at risk, while the Osborne-era austerity measures affect women disproportionately. Male sexual violence and male sexual harassment of women and girls, under the euphemisms “gendered bullying” and “child-on-child sexual assault”, are now endemic from school to university, inspired by the pornography men have made of us. | Cuts to essential public services have put rape crisis services, domestic violence shelters and family support projects at risk, while the Osborne-era austerity measures affect women disproportionately. Male sexual violence and male sexual harassment of women and girls, under the euphemisms “gendered bullying” and “child-on-child sexual assault”, are now endemic from school to university, inspired by the pornography men have made of us. |
| Just because we are not in corsets and big hats doesn’t mean that we women do not still experience constant and universal male violence, male sexual harassment, inequality and exploitation. The powers that be need to focus on these 21st-century issues, rather than this po-faced tinkering with the legacy of dead heroines. | Just because we are not in corsets and big hats doesn’t mean that we women do not still experience constant and universal male violence, male sexual harassment, inequality and exploitation. The powers that be need to focus on these 21st-century issues, rather than this po-faced tinkering with the legacy of dead heroines. |
| • Bidisha is a journalist and author | • Bidisha is a journalist and author |