the guy by the door …

Jenna, Aggasiz Theater February 2006.

The Vagina Monologues

The Vagina Monologues has been performed on campus a number of times. I assume that all of them were in the Agassiz Theater in the Radcliffe Yard. I just discovered that Professor Juliet Schor, economist and feminist activist performed in 2000. I went in February of 2006. I did not know Jenna would be in it, but I was not surprised. I had met Jenna shortly after her arrival at Harvard at the Harvard Social Forum. She asked if she could interview me for a paper she was working on. I agreed on condition that I get to see the finished product. She seemed so delicate, I was afraid she would break if I even touched her. I was quite surprised when she was quoted in the Crimson. She was introducing Kim Airs, former HUCTW member, secretary to Dean Harry Rosovsky, and proprietor of the Grand Opening sex boutique. Jenna said, “Last year, before this, I thought I was having really good sex,…” At least, that’s what the Crimson says she said.

I was very impressed with the Vagina Monologues. It was highly graphic, but everyone was fully clothed. Most impressive was the comraderie nee sisterhood that permeated the cast and audience flowing seamlessly through the procenium.

The Women’s Center Art Show: More than Skin Deep

I am not free of sexism anymore than I am free of racism, anti-semitism, anti-Islamism, or any other form of xenophobia¹. I am very much a work in progress. I may have a certain vestigial prudery That is, I may have not fully escaped confusion about the relationship between Capitalism, Empire, and Sex. So when I received an invitation to the show, I wondered. I knew Jenna was in it. In fact, her’s was the “centerpiece.” Would she want me there to support her political activism? Or would she discover ways in which she is still a work in progress. That is, would she be creeped out showing a giant picture of her vulva to man in a dead end job who is older than her father? So I wrote to the curator of the exhibit. “By all means come, ” would have been fine. Or to tactfully decline with, possibly a hint about the reason, would have been fine. But what I got was no response at all. I feel that the Woman’s Center, an otherwise nobel effort, failed on that one.

I did realize there most probably are disparate views about how to address the relationship between class and sexuality. The woman HUPD officer, whose name I have temporarily forgotten, probably has a somewhat class bound view of things. Don’t get me wrong. The Center needs a Woman officer and self-defense training is highly recommended. But, the police should not be the major determinant of the sexual mores on campus. Similarly, the issue of rape, which Citizen Harry² regards as the most pressing issue of student life, cannot be solved by appeal to administrative authority.

¹Were I to include the full list it would consume a petabyte of storage on the server. [Canadian blogger jurgen claims this is half the content of all U.S. academic research libraries, but he gives no reference. Maybe j knows.] You may have noticed that Christianity is missing from the list. This is because having been raised in several disparate flavors of the Beast, my uneasiness is not based in ignorance as with those things I named. Based in familiarity, my critique of Christianity is somewhat more animated.

²“Citizen” is the appelation I use to refer to a member of the community who had administrative responsibility and subsequently returned to civilian life. I told Citizen Harry that I did so with love and he said he believed me. The statement about rape is from his book, “Excellence without Soul.”