ok it's really interesting is it used to be very acceptable and even admirable for young women to have close 'romantic friendships' involving sleeping on the same pillow and writing love letters to eachother and kissing and like, it was assumed not to be sexual but it's a level of closeness that would get 2 men accused of homosexuality instantly. however the main catch here was that they would be expected to eventually give this up and marry a man in order to support themselves like the behaviour was permissible but the long term refusal of men wasn't.

but then in the later 19th century women's colleges started to be a big thing and middle class women were more accepted into the world of work, and that's where you get these Boston marriages of two educated women who are usually both working or else involved with suffrage, social reform, union activity etc. and these were lifelong commitments where two women kept a house together and never married men or had children and it was a very explicit rejection of domestic life.

and THAT is when the idea of lesbian sexuality started to become pathologised and distrust of women being too intimate arose. and it was connected to their refusal to be housewives and mothers but it was also connected generally to the idea that educating women was warping them and destroying the general population of [white] women and thus the future of the race, as well as the fact that connections between women formed at women's colleges were allowing them to a. support themselves independently of a man and b. enter into previously male dominated worlds like medicine and academia.

so if was not really a specific rejection of sexual and romantic activity between women at all, but the fear that women's intimate connections with eachother was loosening the patriarchy's grip over them. some boston-married women were certainly lesbians, but some also seem to have been heterosexual women who just didn't want to give up their career and independence for a lifetime of domestic drudgery, and preferred having someone they weren't romantically attracted to as a close companion over someone who would never see them as an equal.

anyway i think this is really interesting regarding my view that lesbian emancipation is very closely intertwined with women's emancipation in general; if lesbians arent liberated it is also indicative of the status of women in general, and lesbians can never be free except when women are free. I think it's so interesting how the mainstream gay rights movement really flounders regarding lesbianism, because whilst gay men are able to proceed by challenging misinformed prejudice against gay people simply because they're different, lesbian identity is in much more direct conflict with the patriarchy in a way that can never be resolved without dismantling the patriarchy.

society doesn't actually have that huge of a problem with seeing two women holding hands. sweeping away that surface level ignorance the way the modern gay rights movement does ends up just highlighting how much further we have to go, and i don't know that we'll actually make much more progress at all with the gentle "respect people that are different, love is love<33" approach tbh.

im honestly disheartened that the more visible lgbt people become, the more lesbian identity is handled with gloves on, and the less gnc lesbians are centred in our community. this is NOT me playing oppression olympics or minimising the homophobia faced by gay men and bi people, and I haven't even attempted to incorporate the overlap of race and transphobia into this post bc that would become endless and also not my place to elaborate, just my specific observance of the way the current mainstream lgbt movement is failing lesbians. that's not to say it isn't also failing other groups in other ways!!!

STATE OF THE UNION SALUTE

In a very short period of time BRUJAS turned from a concept developed by two best friends into an international media phenomenon and heavily active organizing force in NYC culture. There are undeniable complications when a huge amount of unforeseeable attention is poured onto people and concepts that didn’t begin with the intentions of speaking to a global community or on behalf of a local cultural phenomenon. We were and still are finding our way as we navigate the world of radical organizing, press, business, and culture making. This is a state of the union address that hopes to cover where we came from, the journey thus far and what our intentions are moving forward.

Re-Cap Over the last two years BRUJAS has hosted approximately a dozen femme skate meetups as well other urban outdoor spontaneous activities including hiking, capture the flag, and herbal medicine and fermentation workshops. We have thrown over 25 parties at small clubs and apartments as well as large venues for our queer formals ( Anti-Prom and Winter Informal ). Our parties intend to create safe space where women and gender nonconforming people can take charge creatively. Parties are a piece of our larger ongoing #DEATHTOALLMALELINEUPS campaign launched in Summer of 2016. BRUJAS are pushing #DTAML by employing tactics of economic advocacy and creative support for young women and gnc musicians. This campaign will continue making sure our group, affiliates, and close community are regularly performing, making records, and DJing, while also developing strategies around releasing work to the public. In September of 2016 we installed a mini ramp and held two workshops, one on material feminism with Silvia Federici, and another on herbal medicine with Antonia Perez at the New Museum’s feminist summit “Scamming the Patriarchy”. That same month we developed a dada inspired intervention with Zeljka Blaksic titled “Claim Space” at the MoMA for their Ten Year Pop-Rally Anniversary that sought to tackle issues of accessibility in public space. In October BRUJAS joined War of Icaza on a DIY skate and punk tour on the west coast called BRUJA WAR. October also marked the launch of BRUJAS largest political endeavor thus far, the commence of the limited edition streetwear line 1971. 1971 is a multi-media and streetwear project that allowed BRUJAS to establish a legal fund, raise awareness around ongoing prison strikes against slavery behind bars, as well as communicate our group’s position on prisons. We sold $23,000 worth of clothes which were recently produced and distributed. The profits will be allocated in the next few months to support people facing criminalization and incarceration. In November BRUJAS started their residency at RECESS GALLERY titled Brouhaha in collaboration with Zeljka Blaksic. Together they produced 17 programs over less than 2 months including workshops on femme self-defense, home studio recording, silk screening, direct filmmaking, as well as open skate sessions and interactive classes aimed at leftist political education. In December we partnered with the Future Archives to host a public skate party and pop up shop at Lot 17 for Art Basel. Last month we hosted at GHE20G0TH1K for their weekly party Freak Pharmacy. It has been a hectic and extremely inspiring and busy time as a result of dedication, hard work and a commitment to growing our vision. We are eternally grateful for the support from our global community thus far and know our energy has made a positive impact on young people. We are taking a step back to reflect on the last few years and tracing our steps to the beginning. We ask others to understand that we started BRUJAS for ourselves and it now belongs to the world. We are currently taking the steps necessary to honor the responsibility of being influencers in the public eye but also using this as a moment to communicate our creative need for autonomy from outsider’s expectations.     

Origins The first summer of BRUJAS there was no Instagram, no expectations, just amazing, small house parties in Washington Heights and dreams of filming a skate video with our five friends. Two women, and three men, all skaters, BRUJAS. We did our first photoshoot the winter after, prompted by Browntourage, an online magazine dedicated to promoting the work of women of color. The editors found out about BRUJAS by chance backstage at a SZA concert in Oakland. It was the first time BRUJAS experienced the reductionism of a headline but we didn’t care much. Our dreams were multiplied into the universe as we stated a need for a space in culture in between Quartersnacks — a NYC skate brand and magazine, and the Young Lords — a radical political organization. Finding a healthy nexus in that space is more complicated of a feat than we could have ever imagined, making it all the more important and exciting. We now understand building something new without precedent is especially challenging for an entity driven by women who seem to experience unmatched levels of criticism and half the support for their endeavors than their male counterparts.     Massive online visibility from our one article created a domino effect on the internet and we started to see more girls out at the skatepark than ever who told us they had read the piece. Stakes were low and positive momentum was high. Being BRUJAS for better or for worse required the loosest affiliation to our goals and messaging. There was no official membership, you showed up to the skatepark or to a workshop, femme or masc, you Dj’ed, you threw parties, were passionate about live music, skated, gay, graphic designer, BRUJAS. It took shape as an experimental community art form while the press kept reaching out with the intentions of capturing a very specific image they had of the group. Images of female skaters was something they had seen successfully travel the internet, and it was what BRUJAS was best known for, something untapped in NYC subculture. Uncaptured over the years were some of the most committed organizers in BRUJAS who don’t skate but committed hours to organizing programming, design, and furthering the group’s development through their art and energy. There was obviously a positive impact our media engagement was having on the gender homogeneity of skateparks, and we became increasingly inspired by the public’s reception of our movement to do more programming on a larger scale. A few individuals were very active in organizing programs aforementioned to engage our larger community. Given the fact that there were very few institutions in skateboarding or street culture at large for women, this moment in media felt important for us, but also where a lot of mistakes were made. Clicks were the first moment of commodification BRUJAS experienced. Continuing to enter media space without being on the same page, checking in with one another about the significance of creating this media, the purpose of the group, and individuals needs was naive, and an after affect of having an amorphous group with members all over the place in tandem with compromised (by several factors including health) leadership privileged by proximity to whiteness. We are committed to moving forward with an organizational model that is tight and horizontal where all members are on the same page about projects and media. Though this does take away some of the magic of the free-form and open sourced model, it is necessary to ensuring a healthy organization where people can thrive and trust one another. All current members of BRUJAS are committed on every level, from organizing to designing, to building together something bigger than ourselves. As we reflect as an organization we mourn the loss of friendships and co-conspirators due to miscommunication and frustration. Just like the media has miscommunicated and misrepresented, thrown up interpretations of BRUJAS all over the internet, we have learned through experience how digital communication can create feelings of scarcity and lead to real conflict between our comrades. We have and continue to commit ourselves to internal conflict resolution with a method of transformative justice and mediation. Reflecting on how we communicate our messages to the public and with each other is of primary importance over the next few months as we build our organization internally.   

Growing Accountability

Our experience with the media has demonstrated the dangers of encouraging things that lead women to accept their image as their primary source of value. The media is still misogynist in this respect. The media should only be covering things BRUJAS are DOING, because representation and existence is not enough at this point. Existence in a world built on slavery and colonialism is radical, but we feel organizing, when possible, is crucial. Placing our value on effort, talent, and facilitation is what will sustain BRUJAS beyond the media frenzy, and will continue our personal and collective growth in creative fields. Patriarchal forces will attempt to suffocate us as we evolve into a real threat to men’s businesses and cultural monopolies, whether they are clubs or stores. While the media may have gotten us followers, it still rests on us to engage, challenge and support them. This is where effort, talent and creativity comes in, all of which our group has in abundance. Over the past several months, creating our own content that represents our friends and our culture has been our goal, especially since we experienced so much buzz around us for content created by outsiders. A recent photo project titled “Muertisima” improvised by BRUJAS was an attempt at communicating some concepts we had been developing around illegibility, deviance, and queer sexuality. We asked ourselves: what do BRUJAS look like unedited? We put together a scene that included nudity and BDSM adornment which was directed by Ian Reid, who we consider the most important visual artist and Black filmmaker in NYC skateboarding. BRUJAS received criticism from fans and contemporaries, people we respect and admire who are operating and thinking outside of our immediate context. While we acknowledge these criticisms and are working to be accountable for the harm these images caused people in our community, under the spotlight, many things were erased from the context of these images. From this experience, and the criticism we received, we have come to realize the strong responsibility we hold for operating a platform that speaks to people far beyond our direct community. We are committed to being accountable to the effect the “Muertisma” project has had on folks in and outside our extended community, and own the fact that we are influencing many people, especially young women, through our images and words. We hope to continue to influence women and queers of color to seek liberation, but cannot do so until we address colorism, anti-Blackness, and violence inherent the culture we operate in and that we perpetuate. If compelled, read our response “WOMEN WILL WANT TO HURT EACH OTHER” for our full apology for the harm our “Muertisima” piece created, as well as an explanation of our intentions and an urgent call for respect for the agency, vision, and bodily agency and autonomy of Black artists. Black women have and will continue to be leaders in projects by BRUJAS. We strongly believe that there is nothing more important than re-directing resources to Black women in this time, there is no other way of fighting white-supremacy.

Direction & Politics : The Future of Streetwear, Coalition & Dialect  

BRUJAS IS A FREE FORM, AUTONOMOUS, RADICAL, CREATIVE ORGANIZATION.

Streetwear Less corny press, more original content & entering the streetwear business seriously. We are employing our own media productions skills in hopes to not only take the reigns over how we are understood by others outside our group, but to also fulfill goals stated and recited publicly at multiple events over the last year in the first version of our WOMANIFESTA. “We, as BRUJAS, encourage women’s participation in the creative economy. BRUJAS are harnessing the radical potential of lifestyle and personal branding to organize youth in a way that is culturally relevant and familiar, yet explicitly anti-capitalist. We are searching for a new popular model that is going to bring agency empowerment, material and emotional support to our community.” What some called “branding”, and others affectionately call “propaganda” has been part of our model for some time now. It is important to note that we are taking our design and distribution more seriously with a web store (www.brujas.nyc) as well as original design, and cut-and-sew projects. Streetwear is something that all members of BRUJAS are passionate about and while it is currently made in small quantities where a lot of the clothes are gifted to our community, we plan on growing it this year. The streetwear component of BRUJAS serves multiple purposes, for instance: funding solidarity work via the launch of 1971 streetwear, creating awareness of our politics through utilitarian mediums, funding new projects i.e design production and photo and video, as well as community events like parties and workshops. Like all small groups developing fashion lines, our profits from streetwear including hoodies are re-invested in the growth of BRUJAS and are managed by the streetwear team who have invested time and creative energy in designing, producing and distributing merchandise.

Lastly, making unisex clothes that are artistic representations of our gendered and political experience is in the legacy of centuries of utilitarian art. We find our desire to make clothing very natural. While every male collective in our direct proximity find ways to strategize around their own success (whatever their goals may be) through fraternity and branding, we are finding ourselves having to defend every decision we make. We are a young group of Native to NYC youth who are using every outlet available to develop creative, high caliber projects through multiple mediums. For those surprised or concerned with the ethics of merchandising, we ask that you respect that making streetwear was always a goal of BRUJAS, that each and every member of BRUJAS is PASSIONATE about design and fashion, as we should be. Streetwear is the coup d’eta of fashion, a place where urban youth have taken back control of their dress and identity. We FULLY appreciate the support we have had for our work so far and appreciate those who get the larger picture we are attempting to paint. While some may feel ok wearing skate brands and streetwear designed by men for companies run by men, we are personally unsatisfied by them and feel compelled to make alternatives in a world whose artistic representations continuously fail the queers and rebels. We silkscreen all of our clothing locally, bringing business to our homies in Washington Heights. We will continue to collaborate with women run streetwear brands and other ethically principled companies working in the U.S with good labor practices and production standards. We are also developing products that are intended for self-care and healing. Fast fashion and consumerism have issues and as we create space for ourselves in this world we must constantly remind ourselves of our origins and intentions of tirelessly serving the people and supporting our internal community. BRUJAS is a creative organization that makes streetwear, we also organize, we use streetwear to spread ideas and organize people, and we will continue to do this bigger, better and more creatively within the frame of our original vision.

Coalition

BRUJAS are not afraid to talk about and confront systems of racial domination, power and exploitation, ever, or to admit our mistakes. We commit ourselves to being better co-conspirators for those most affected by white supremacy. However, we do not necessarily believe in, or appreciate infighting in radical communities based on identitarian differences. We understand that not everybody is down with multi-racial coalition, and we understand why. We respect other people’s approaches, and will not obstruct other people’s tactics: whether they are separatist, or more focused on the ways identity categories produce material conditions and visa versa. We do not assume or judge individuals based on what we know about their identity, as there is no way to really know the complexities of people’s lives. We do however study and critique history, understand the functions race and gender have played in sustaining exploitation under capitalism, and strategize to remove power from that structure accordingly. We have been greatly inspired recently by research we have done on the Rainbow Coalition, a group comprised of The Young Patriots (self-proclaimed white radical hillbillies), the Young Lords, and the Black Panther Party. Our political work has and will continue to be about coalition building amongst difference. We have also been inspired by guidance from Silvia Federici who told us “I trust that when people begin to seriously organize they realize they cannot work on the basis of exclusionary politics.” We are harnessing our collective energy, regardless of identity, with the intentions of redistribution and reparations for all that have and will continue to be exploited and alienated under capitalism.

Creating hierarchies amongst oppressed people is harmful and antithetical to building coalition. We do not use these politics to create ammunition for arguments, especially when facing interpersonal conflicts. However, we do understand that personal conflict is not experienced in a vacuum, and is exacerbated by unchecked privileges. However, we also believe constantly fighting one another using differentiation often creates pain in place of healing, or yet, creates a world where many people feel like they literally don’t want to be anybody. We commit ourselves to understanding, mediation, and self-care in order to prioritize all of our mental health. BRUJAS works internally as a multi-ethnic group that trust each other and believe that supporting the people is a daily practice that should be approached from a collectivist and material standpoint, not only one that centers the individual and their identity.

Dialect

BRUJAS approaches race and culture with the understanding that nothing is fully pure, authentic, or better based on abstractions developed by archaic epistemology and later reinforced by essentializing and racist media. By virtue of being from New York, a group of anti-capitalist queers, mixed race kids, and gender nonconforming people, we are a creative organization that thrives in the borderlands, the hybrid and illegible space of being. In order to resist essentialism we can be nothing but ourselves. We built our affinities in organizing meetings, in the skatepark, on the playground, at block parties our parents organized when we were kids. Now, we find our affinities based on the affect and politics we share, not any particular identity.

Essentialism is the view that for any specific entity there is a set of attributes which are necessary to its identity and function. When rigid attributes are applied to race and culture, they are essentialized. We know essentialism is mythological, fabricated by a white-supremacist and capitalist superstructure for the benefit of its continuity. We are committed to a holistic approach to culture making that honors people’s relationship to modern indigeneity, diaspora and multi-racialism. In New York, youth who are native to the city, often children of immigrants are creating a new culture that holds space for our larger community to be free. We recognize that the word BRUJAS holds a historical connotation to Latinx spirituality, with pre-capitalist approaches to healing and community. We never had the intention of speaking on behalf of all “BRUJAS” as they exist across historical and cultural landscapes. BRUJAS describes a political and creative organization of a multi-ethnic group of friends and comrades, all of whose ancestors suffered at the hands of patriarchy and colonialism. We believe everybody is entitled to their own interpretation and expression of resistance culture. Though ours takes a modern form that is non-separatist and committed to progressive and modern sounds, words and images, we still have respect for people who honor tradition and heritage as their own resistance. Spanish was the first if not mutual language in the Lower East Side and Uptown for many of BRUJAS. We don’t have to rock with things in the way other people do, there is strength in diverse approaches to similar concepts. While some may be invested in the integrity of the history of bruja, the youth and community we serve benefits from progress and relevant adaptations all over the cultural spectrum. We respect tradition and hold space for it in some of our programming, but refuse to be limited by it. We are self aware of our role in the spiraling historical movements driven by social conflict and contradiction, we understand dialectical materialism. People all over the Americas assigned their own meanings to things in their lives in a language spread by colonization. We continue this resistance by assigning old worlds new meanings, this is a part of dialectics, a part of the course of history. Projects like BRUJAS are the social and material response to the contradictions of capital, linguistic tradition, and epistemological progress that moves history forward.  

BRUJAS is positively for the youth, for ourselves, and now for the world. We are going to develop this as far as we possibly can, without fear and without limitations, but with accountability, respect and humility. We are seeking a new world, if you are too, you are BRUJAS. Thank you for your time, kindness, understanding and support over these years, with love.

BRUJAS