Safer Space sign by Molly Fair
I wrote this the day after the IGGU zine release party. It's been a long month since the event, and we still have yet to hear much in terms of feedback on the project; please be encouraged to get in touch. In this post I take music and cultural production pretty seriously; if you'd like to see me get a little less serious and a little more music-y, then find me on tumblr, where I post kind of often.
So. Last night was the International Girl Gang Underground zine release party at Death by Audio.
Unfortunately, co-editor Stacy Konkiel could not make it into town (from across the country), so I curated this show and ran it on my own, so to speak, but I use those words loosely.
I was only able to book and run this successful, comfortable, well-attended, super-fun event, because of the community members and allies who participated. It is difficult to create feminist work in a genuine way, especially in a punk context: an aesthetic, social, and musical practice that often walks the line between parody and political concern. I read comments where an activist questioned the "safer space" policy of the evening [1], asking how we would avoid a fascist policing of our event space. Then, I read along as another person responded quite eloquently, that, "What this policy means practically, is that the organizers have the backs of survivors." It felt good not to have to respond, arguably for the first time in my life, because someone else had done it for me. Later, I would see more comments that mocked my choice to promote a safer space in a serious way, but, I digress.
Jamie Varriale Velez. Video courtesy of Stephanie Andares.
American Sun
I could not have dreamed as a teenager that I would be making music, or zines, or art for my friends, that I would be where I am today. More importantly, I could not have dreamed of having resources like Support New York or NYC Coalition for Safer Spaces that I (and others) could employ to make my own events more comfortable for everyone -- namely, survivors of sexual assault, but also, to create a space that is freer of the drudgery of everyday life (i.e., axes of oppression in its many forms). Perhaps some people don't see the need for this kind of space because they don't feel it regularly, but, I do.
