Ueno Chizuko
◎ Yang Zao (writer)
Ryomi Suzuki said that her mother is an intellectual woman. Even if she doesn’t have a job, she looks down on the “group of mothers” around her and hates those who do business with “feminineness”. However, she likes to dress up and laughs at the female scholars who dress up in a rustic manner. “She clearly desires to be an expensive product, but despises those women who actually betray her. This makes me feel uncomfortable, so I completely sold myself.”
Ueno Chizuko said that your mother adopts a survival strategy that elite women often adopt, that is, “I am different from them”, and at the same time, she refuses to empathize with housewives and female scholars , which is actually a misogyny.
Ryomi Suzuki said that my mother loves me with all her strength, and I am also the subject of her research as a child's literature expert. Since I was a child, I had to explain all my behaviors in words. This suffocated me.
Chizuko Ueno said that all the boring things we did when we were young were because they were "forbidden by our parents". Once our parents were gone, these things would lose their meaning.
Yes, Ryomi Suzuki said, after my mother passed away, I completely withdrew from the night world.
…
73-year-old Chizuko Ueno is a professor of humanities and sociology at the University of Tokyo, and the most famous feminist in Japan; 38-year-old Ryomi Suzuki graduated from the University of Tokyo, and a reporter from the Nippon Kei Shimbun. In 2022, her novel "Talented" was shortlisted for one of the highest awards in Japanese literature Akutagawa Ryunosuke Award top five.
The two of them formed the "Start at the Extreme: A Book of Feminist Communication" between the first spring and the second spring when the epidemic hit. The twelve communication themes are: Erotic Capital, Mother and Daughter, Love and Sex, Marriage, Desire for Recognition, Ability, Work, Independence, Unity, Feminism, Freedom, and Men.
Before I opened the book, I thought "Start at the Extreme" was a feminist enlightenment book. Especially it is very popular, which makes me wary. In fact, this is the kind of "good book": it makes people feel mixed and difficult to comment after reading it, but you know you will eventually open it again because there are too many questions without answers in it.
"starts at the limit", Suzuki Ryomi's explanation is "I am standing at the limit, I examine things from where I am." Chizuko Ueno experienced the Japanese women's liberation movement for half a century throughout, and was one of the first scholars to bring feminism into the academic circle and public vision; Suzuki Ryomi entered and exited the "original store" at the age of 16, and then had a nightclub experience, and later published a related master's thesis.
Whether in terms of personal experience or research, they have reached the limit that ordinary people cannot imagine.
But, are they sure they have crossed the hill? If you were sure, you wouldn't have this book.
As the book says, the epidemic is also a limit, and life is at the boundary at any time. Communication in abnormal living conditions can produce unexpected expressions. "Although I know that the letters will be made public, when I think of myself and you one-on-one 'face-to-face', I feel that there is no room for fooling or excuses." Suzuki Ryomi's words always make Chizuko Ueno "the old wounds in her previous life are vaguely aches", thus breaking the precept of "I sell my ideas, but I don't sell my feelings" and not afraid to tell my personal history and physical feelings.
Ryomi Suzuki admitted that she has always strongly resisted "speaking from the perspective of the victim." Like her mother, Ryomi Suzuki's strategy is also "I'm different from them." She doesn't want to be the object of sympathy and rescue. (Remind me of the joke of talk show actor Yang Li : "What do you want to see, but I don't grow anything.")
Chizuko Ueno told Ryomi Suzuki that in fact, "if it hurts, you will cry out for pain." Both the body and the spirit are fragile products, "treat fragile products as fragile products." Chizuko Ueno laughed at herself and said that she was "a relative and aunt mentality."
People are full of confusion, so why isn’t society the same? Female students at the University of Tokyo will also conceal their education in social situations to get a "cute but no threat" evaluation.This made both correspondents feel sad: Can women still not gain recognition by their own strength until today? Even those women with very superior social structures cannot break the "myth of happiness that is not perfect without marriage." Work achievements, economic independence, and social recognition seem to be unable to eliminate the restraint and influence of "structure" on women.
Chizuko Ueno advises students: Don’t let yourself become a discarded item that society uses up. She also pointed out that the emergence of a large number of girls who are "shy" who prioritize their own interests, including pursuing "easy marriage", may be the progress of the times. However, this kind of self-interest does not have to be pursued through men, nor does it need to be modified in gender terms.
Inspired by this, Suzuki Ryomi summarized two/two generations of women’s response strategies to patriarchal society: our generation has learned a lot of ways to avoid harm, including how to use pepper spray and wear appropriate clothes, but it is easy to ignore and question the social structure itself, which actually gives the patriarchal tendency to evade responsibility; young women today are brave enough to criticize the patriarchal social structure, but only pursue criticism without avoiding it, which easily makes themselves bruised. Both correspondents agree that women in patriarchal society "must be grasped with both hands", but "it's really difficult to do contradictory things at the same time." The final conclusion of
seems to be hopeless. But "despair" is also a limit. If I were asked to summarize the theme of "Start at the Extreme", it would be "How to make feminism a daily life carrying life experiences." There is often an insurmountable gap between the world of concept and daily life.
One of the "limits" of Ryomi Suzuki is her experience since adolescence, which makes her unable to devote herself to serious relationships even if she leaves the night world. She repeatedly asked Chizuko Ueno: Why haven't you felt desperate about men after experiencing so many "gutters"? Chizuko Ueno's answer is: Because in books and in life, there are still many respectable men.
In my opinion, Chizuko Ueno's answer is quite powerless. The problem itself contains the premise of essentializing gender. If gender is the absolute standard for division, then there will be no "male feminist" and "dad-like women". The advantage of gender essentialization is that it is full of pleasure, and the disadvantage is that it cuts butter like a hot meal knife, which cuts everyday life experience into pieces. "Anyway, men are helpless." "Men, shut up!" is a decisive and seductive concept that can also echo the emotions of the victims in reality. But logically, this is no different from the "four legs are good, two legs are bad" in "Animal Manor".
The two female authors’ correspondence under the epidemic has been completed, and the search and questioning starting from the limit is not just women in our daily lives.
2022-10-30
