Go Go Go Guerrillas

I must say, I agree with the overall sense of dissatisfaction among attendants. I agree that it would have been much more empowering if it had been less planned and performed somewhere like the library bridge rather than at the Brooke’s Center. You win some, you lose some, right?

After reading some of your comments, one thing has really jumped out at me. It seems no one considers themselves a feminist…it has too many bad connotations. This really seems to parallel their use of stereotype dolls. Perhaps they should create Nichole, the femi-Nazi? The dolls were perhaps the thing I remember the most…the attitudes captured there are right on. I consider myself a feminist and I don’t hate men. I rather like them. Of course, most of the guys I associate with don’t demean women. I still find it shocking that there are still so many male-dominated attitudes/beliefs floating around, not just in America but in the world. India and China and Africa definitely come to mind. However, how many women in our class have tried to buy a car? I tried for two weeks to get in touch with a man selling an old convertible Impalla and left message after message. Eventually, I had my guy friend call him for me and he called back ten minutes later. Apparently, the man didn’t want some girl trying to take care of his “baby.” Also, at the Vagina Monologues, I went outside during intermission to smoke and overheard the director asking her mother if her father was handling it okay. The mother just looked exasperated and was like, “we’re leaving.” It seems he couldn’t handle hearing about women admitting to enjoying pleasure and saying dirty words and talking about their sex organs. What gives? Has anyone seen the movie Iron Jawed Angels?

I don’t carry negative-male attitudes, I just can see where the inequality creeps up from time to time. A lot of it is due to old world attitudes, but I feel they need to change for us to be a progressive nation. A progressive world. It’s not a slow change, or it wouldn’t last, but I think the Guerrilla Girls have built up their ethos in trying to bring about this slow change. It has to start somewhere.

I wanted to see the Guerrillas be more action-oriented in their delivery, but then again, while speaking with them after the power point presentation, I noticed how old they are. Perhaps they just don’t have the energy for that sort of fire anymore. I will give them credit for publishing books and giving lectures and helping to evolve the state of museums, but as to this particular presentation…

All in all, they gave us the forensics of the situation, with an expectation of a call to action. They didn’t deliver the resolving factor in their world of possibilities. Their logic was sound, their appropriateness perhaps didn’t hold. There was no sense of urgent “this must change NOW” exigence. It was more like, “aww, look at the facts. Do something.” I understood them to be promoting this idea of THINK FOR YOURSELF when they didn’t answer questions and give easy answers, but the fact is, they didn’t give us any answers at all. I consider their presentation to be less of an act of guerrilla attack and more of a board meeting at a feminist journal/ at a university auditorium.

And I also understand that they had to be appropriate for the university and I don’t hate them. I'm very glad that they came and I felt lucky to see them. I just feel, going back to Poulakos, they set us up for something and could have delivered in a much more inspiring manner.