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A U ST R A L IA N LEFT REVIEW N o. 76
R E V IE W S
G y n /E c o lo g y : T h e M e ta e th ic s o f
R a d ic a l F e m in ism by M ary Daly. The
Women's Press 1979. Reviewed by M arg o
M oore.
G yn/E cology is both a celebration/cerebration
of women's power and a savage rejection of the
necrophilia of Patriarchy. M ary Daly comes from
a theological background and her book echoes
th a t tradition. W ritten in a poetic, visionary style,
G yn/E cology is a Journey, a process, it is for the
"H ag/C rone/S pinster in every Living woman. It
is for each individual Journeyer to decide/expand
the scope of this im agination w ithin her. It is she,
and she alone, who can determine how far, and in
w hat way she can/w ill travel. She and she alone,
can dis-cover the m ystery of her own history, and
find how it is interwoven with the lives of other
women." (p.xiii)
The second section is a more detailed
exam ination of a num ber of system s of control
and torture of women .... foot-binding, genital
m utilation, A merican gynaecology. And the third
is a call to women to abandon P atriarchy, to create
our own 'otherw orld'. We "whirl into another
frame of reference.... U nw eaving their deceptions
we nam e our Truth. Defying their professions we
discover our Female Pride, our Sinister Wisdom.
Escaping their possession we find our Enspiriting
Selves. Overcoming their aggression we uncover
our Creative A nger an d Brilliant Bravery.
D em ystifying/dem ythifying their obsessions we
re-member our Woman-loving love. Refusing their
assim ilation we experience our Autonomy and
Strength. Avoiding their elim ination we find our
O rig in a l B e in g . M en d in g th e ir im posed
fragm entation we Spin our O riginal Integrity ...."
(p.423)
The history of women, of course, intersects and
is played out w ithin the structures of Patriarchy.
For Daly "P atriarchy is the hom eland of males; it
is the F ather Land and men are its agents ....
Males and m ales only are the originators,
p la n n e rs , co n tro lle rs a n d le g itim a to rs of
P atriarchy" (p.39). Within P atriarchy there exists
a sta te of w ar in which men strive to subdue the
power and independence of women through
p rac tice s as fo o t-b in d in g , w itc h -b u rn in g
suttee and ultim ately through the an nihilation of
women altogether by themselves giving birth to
transexuals, test-tube babies, etc.
It is extremely difficult to review the book
because it can be and is read in so m any different
ways. At a discussion a t the M arxist Summer
School, one of the recurring comments was th a t
people had found it "inspirational" .... th a t it had
generated a whole ran g e of ideas and opened up
new ways of seeing things. It was also suggested
th a t to read the book on an em pirical level is a
mistake, and th a t w hat the book is about is
"Representations" .... that the sections on Suttee
for example, were about how the laws and
practices of P atriarch y are inscribed on women's
bodies.
The structure of the book is in three parts. The
first section establishes the background, the
p atterns and methods of P atriarchal Culture. In
particular, she focusses on m yth and language.
"This book is prim arily concerned w ith the
m ind/sp irit/b o d y pollution inflicted through
patriarchal^ m yths and language on all levels.
These levels range from styles of gram m ar to
styles of glamour, from religious m yth to dirty
jokes, from theological hym ns honouring the
'Real Presence' of C hrist to commercial cooing of
Coca-Cola as the 'Real T h in g '.... Phallic m yth and
language generate, legitim ate and m ask the
m aterial pollution th a t threatens to term inate all
sentient life on this planet." (p.8)
It is th is aspect of the book which m any radical
fem inists identify with an d develop in a political
sense with other women. Im ages from the
Background, presented in Sydney by the Fools
Gallery T heatre Com pany derives its inspiration
from G yn/E cology in th a t the com pany delineates
the "Background .... the unnoticed, disregarded
field of reality a g a in st which the perceived
acceptable 'business of life' is played" (Program
notes, p.l). For the Fools Gallery Com pany
however the purpose of such a delineation is to
"attem pt to put power an d joy into living as
individuals, an attem p t to delineate and then
destroy the barriers between men and women and
the world." (ibid)
REVIEWS
43
A lthough this is th e political im plication which
m any people draw from G yn/Ecology I do not
think th a t this is M ary D aly's political vision. Nor
do I th in k you can accept the book as a poetic
vision only and not as an attem pt to come to term s
with everyday reality. Daly goes to great lengths
to attack the publicly recognised women's
movements as "m ale designed, m ale orchestrated,
m ale le g itim a te d , m a le a s s im ila te d " . S he
sim ilarly attack s the hom osexual movement and
fem inist therapy. She criticises m any women as
"fem bots", "D a d d y 's girl", "D ad d y 's little
Titterers" in an ironic use of the labelling she is so
critical of in other people. She m akes specific
practical political suggestions, as for example, her
solution to the contraceptive problem .... "It is
obvious to H ags th a t few gynaecologists
recommend to their heterosexual patients the
m ost foolproof of solutions, nam ely Misterectomy. The Spinsters who propose this way by
our be-ing, liv-ing, speak-ing can do so w ith power
precisely because we are not preoccupied with
ways to get off the heterosexually defined
contraceptive dilem m a." (p.239)
A r c h ite c t o r B ee? T h e H u m a n /T e c h n o lo g y
R e la tio n s h ip by M ike Cooley, published in
Australia by TNC, $8.95. Reviewed by P e te r
M aso n .
Read on th is level I th in k th a t the book h a s very
deep political and theoretical failings. One m ost
obvious exam ple is th e a-historicism of her work.
The framework of P atriarch y is assum ed in all
instances. There is no other explanation for witchburning for example, th a n th a t men h ate and
w ant to destroy women. No reference is made to
struggles in the Church, the class divisions in
society, n atu ra l disasters m aking for instability
during th a t period. It is the sam e with the other
sections of the book on genital m utilation, suttee,
foot-binding, etc.
One very im portant step towards this end would
be to render democratic the governm ent o f every
organisation .... There can be no real freedom or
democracy until the people who do the work in a
business also control its m anagem ent".
There is no w ay open for any criticism w ithin
the framework of th e book. Daly specifically
castigates those who would be critical as
"fembots", token women doing D addy's work. In
this respect, I think the book m ust be seen to be
extremely au th o ritarian and anti-women.
In term s of political strategy, there is no
consideration of the m aterial circum stances of
most women's lives, certainly no consideration of
how men and women m ight live w ithout
e x p lo ita tio n a n d d o m in a tio n sin ce it is
presupposed th a t th a t is impossible, and to strive
to do so is merely a distraction and draining of our
energy w hich should be woman-centred. There is
no attention paid to the class nature of capitalist,
or any other society, an d the bearing this has on
P atriarch al power relations in such a society, or
the functions P atriarch y fulfils in class society.
Despite such criticism s G yn/E cology does raise
one of the m ost fundam ental political and
personal problems for women .... th a t is, given the
violence w hich has been, and continues to be,
practised ag a in st women, how is it possible to
create a society where women and men can live in
harm ony.
In 1917 B ertrand Russell wrote a speech for the
w ar workers of Glasgow dealing w ith a pressing
problem th a t is every bit as pressing today: how,
as an individual, to avoid being crushed by the
huge, im personal institutions of the tw entieth
century. Above all how to escape the tendency to
greed an d self interest which, he said, modern
capitalism forces upon all who are not heroic or
exceptionally fortunate.
"V ast organisations", he told them, "are an
inevitable elem ent in modern life, and it is useless
to aim at their abolition ....It is true th a t they m ake
the preservation o f individuality more difficult,
but w hat is needed is a w ay o f com bining them
with the greatest possible scope for individual
initiative.
In the sixty years th a t have passed since th a t
speech the problems of the individual in the face of
these v ast organisations have grown so great th a t
m ost of us, being neither heroic nor exceptionally
fortunate, feel generally overwhelmed by them.
A rchitect or Bee throws a unique and b rillian t
spotlight on these problems of modern living. It
shows how a group of workers in E ngland, far
from being daunted by the size and technical
power of their institution, have used their
im agination to discover how th a t very technology
could be used efficiently an d profitably for
socially useful purposes. And not only did they
show it: they actually did it!
Mike Cooley's title, Architect orBee, highlights
the hum an im portance of retaining some
in d iv id u a l in itia tiv e in th e p ro cesses of
production. It comes from a passage in Das
Kapital:
A bee puts to sham e m any an architect in the
construction o f its cells; but w hat distinguishes
the worst o f architects from the best o f bees in this.
The architect raises the structure in im agination
before it is erected in reality. A t the end o f every
labor process, we get a result th a t already existed
in the im agination o f the labourer at its
com m encm ent.
Cooley him self is an industrial designer who
has seen his profession changed out of recognition
by the coming of the computer. Yet he's saddened
by his observation th a t the h um an liberation