Activism Issues: Collectives and Conferences

[julieisafemme]

Originally Posted by Medusa

I've been watching some of the discussion around the Butch Voices Conference issues of late unfold on these boards and many others over the last few days. It occurred to me that these "top-down" steering issues where sexism, capitalism, internalised misogyny take root is not specific to just the BV conference.

I was a founding member of the Femme Collective and worked on the organizing committee from 2005 - 2008. I stepped down in 2009 after some very similar issues now being discussed started manifesting.

I also remember attending the Queering Femininity conference in Seattle in 2005 and some of the inherent issues that were brought up in that conference.

All of the discussion lately has compelled me to start a thread where we can specifically discuss these issues - what we expect financially from conferences put on by our community, how we feel about the identities of steering committee members in identity-specific conferences. Maybe even the idea of organizing around politics and not identity.

I realized I did not address the specific issues you asked about:

I don't really expect anything financially from conferences put on by the community. Maybe I am not understanding the question. I expect to get some good content for my money. I don't know that I expect more than that. I have not been disappointed in any community conferences I have attended thus far.

Again I think that as long as the content is good in a conference I am not too concerned about the identities of the steering committee members. I am disconcerted at the discussion of Joe's identity .

Organizing around politics sounds great to me!! This is what I have been wondering in the religion threads but was not communicating as succintly.