Thursday, February 11, 2010

The Rag

While reading this piece I felt bad for the women going through this experience. However, I do agree with the authors statement that with time she was able to look back and reflect on what really happened and why the Rag did not succeed. Due to this I do not think these women could have foreseen and fixed the problems before they happened. Yet, I was surprised that they did not realize that they were all different- they all had different background from their race to how and where they were brought up and how much money they had. Whenever bringing people together for a common good, those identities have to be addressed and either forgotten or somewhat kept in mind. I say forgotten because it no longer is about just each individual- they are now all working together and thus a new identity is formed. This new identity is the one that should be focused on. I guess the difference is that this group was a feminist group that began to realize that women are all different and instead of uniting on this issue it tore them apart.

1 comment:

  1. After reading this piece, like Emily, I was also somewhat surprised that the members of The Rag were unable to see how their own individual differences would have had an effect on their common goal. However, I think that people who are so passionate about implementing change often fail to take a step back and see how their common interest is interpreted differently by everyone in the group. As discussed in class, many women viewed the women's movement through very different lenses. Although black and white women had a similar long term goal, equality for women, they were both experiencing their victimization of male superiority in different ways. I think that there is a valuable lesson learned from this chapter due to the fact that in order for an effort like this to succeed it is vital that all of the members understand where everyone else is coming from and use this to their advantage to achieve their goal.

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