2003-02-07 Speeches- too true not to hurt

This is a collection of speeches Andrea Dworkin made during the 1970's wherever she could get her brand of feminism across in a largely patriarchal American society. As way of introduction Dworkin tells of her struggles to be heard- especially by other women and the (mostly bad) reactions she received from her lectures. Her perseverance to carry on trying to spread her ideas is admirable even if you are critical of her ideas. It is worrying though how much of her speeches ring true- even if you believe Dworkin a rabid man-hater or one who faces up to the truth that a male dominated society refuses to acknowledge. There also can be no denying Dworkin's ability to move people or make her points punchy, clear and with no bows to sentimentality.
Dworkin talks about rape, abuse and inequality forwardly and without apology. She challenges the established institutions- the courts, the government, the education system. Some of her ideas are very memorable such as making Halloween an official mourning day for all the women who were killed by ignorant and misogynistic societies for practicing "witchcraft".
Hugely moving and bile raising it is easy to see how offence was taken by Dworkin's listeners in the 1970's but the question IOB leaves us with is: how would audiences react to these speeches in the supposedly more liberated twenty first century? I fear not much differently.