Republican News · Thursday 31 January 2002

POWER SHARING WITH WOMEN

"Man's experience is human experience: women's experience is women's experience."

This was only one of many prejudicial and telling remarks explaining sexism made at a workshop on women's rights at Coiste's summer school.

What made this workshop on this topic different from others that I have been at over the years was the context in which it was set as well as the anecdotes that primed the discussion.

The scene was set by Laurence McKeown, one of the conference organisers and a former political prisoner in the H Blocks, and Joanna McMinn, Chairwoman of the National Women's Council of Ireland.

They brought an 'inside the prisons' perspective to the discussion, Laurence the prisoner and Joanna the lecturer who supervised 200 republican prisoners through a course titled Changing Experience of Women.

The take up among republican prisoners for the course was remarkable and may in part be explained by the fact that the prisoners, vulnerable themselves, could empathise with women in their politically vulnerable situation.

There were different levels of hostility towards the course. For example, the prison warders couldn't bring themselves to mention the term 'women's studies'.

When they were informing the prisoner about the weekly class, they would merely say "there's a teacher here for you". This was not the normal practice.

On occasions, a warder would try to intimidate the lecturer by describing the prisoner she was about to see as 'dangerous' and offering her protection inside the classroom. This also was not the norm.

Warders would occasionally slag a prisoner they saw bringing a cup of tea out to a female lecturer. 'Where's the apple for the teacher?' they would ask, sarcastically. This rarely happened if the teacher was male.

Some republican prisoners, afraid that their peers would slag them, hid their feminist books in the classroom rather than be seen carrying them on the wing.

Others, who were married, were bantered about being 'born again husbands' now that they were in gaol and separate from their partners.

One prisoner doing the course refused to carry a copy of girls' magazine 'the Bunty' for the same reason. Some republicans voiced opposition to the course.

It was these small expressions as much as the big issues that challenged those doing the course.

Loyalists blanked the course. Not one loyalist prisoner enlisted for it.

This observation prompted a wider discussion about the lack of education within the loyalist section of the prison.

Open University lecturer, who had spent many years teaching prisoners, said that interest in education by loyalists suffered because of their macho culture, symbolised through their 'tattoos and gold medallions'. They viewed education as a weakness. Feminist education wasn't even thought about.

Whereas republicans had a collective response to education and promoted it, loyalist interest was individual. A loyalist prisoner expressing an interest in education often ran a gauntlet of abuse from those around him.

other lecturer described how, over a period of months, she saw the confidence of women prisoners in Magabherry growing as they went through the women's course only to find that confidence badly knocked following a period of strip-searching by the warders.

Strip-searching was used to try to humiliate and intimidate women prisoners, to strip them of their personal power as well as their dignity.

We were reminded that 15,000 republicans served 100,000 years behind bars over the 30 years of the conflict and their mothers, wives, sisters and partners served that time with them.

It was easier in gaol to identify with and promote women's rights and equality because it was a rarefied atmosphere where ideas were cost-free in terms of their consequences, personal and political.

There was literally a captive audience, where debate was as much a part of prison life as a weekly visit.

Nonetheless, the experience gained by many of those who took the feminist course has stood the test of time and has influenced the course of their lives beyond the prison gates.

Outside, ex-prisoners found there was less opportunity for them to debate feminist issues.

This was the not the case for those at the workshop, whose feminist views were shaped by their experiences on the outside. They did, however, deal with the same sexist attitudes expressed inside the prison.

This is reflected in the inequality in broader society, where women's and men's work is not valued equally. Inside personal relationships, women are expected to carry additional burdens.

In many cases, a man's work is done when he walks through the door, whereas a woman has to rear the family and carry out most of the domestic chores.

She has little or no economic independence, even if she works outside the home as well as inside it.

She is expected to manage the family's weekly budget, feed everyone and clothe the children.

Society often praised a man if he was a 'good provider' but very often this meant the woman had the extra responsibility of managing what was provided.

Many of the women said they often felt guilty if they bought themselves clothes or perfume out of the family budget.

Most of them felt that society does not put the same value on the work done by women inside the house as that done by men outside the house.

Women's work is taken for granted.

What women needed inside a relationship was 'partnership not dictatorship'.

Women and men had to share power with each other, especially when rearing children and doing housework.

Sexist attitudes crossed the class divide. One woman told the story of joining a group of mothers who gave of their time to advise doctors how to handle women during their pregnancy and birth. One of the senior doctors sought advice on the type of 'jam on scones' women would prefer.

It was accepted that men's attitudes were changing. It is not unusual to see young men pushing their children in prams. Also, manufacturers are putting children's changing facilities inside men's toilets and men attending their child's birth is now routine.

It was generally agreed that women had made progress in establishing their rights and that few women today would tolerate being treated the way society treated their mothers.

It was also agreed that more women were needed in public positions of influence in all walks of life but unless they were in there making decisions with men on an equal basis, ie sharing power, personal and political, then society will continue to be driven by and reflect male decisions.

BY JIM GIBNEY