And hopefully, this will be the last time that we have to talk about this.

Source text: ​www.eldiarioar.com/opinion/ojala-sea-ultima-vez-haya-hablar_129_6667918.html

Just when everyone had lost all hope for 2020, then came the legalisation of abortion. I was in the Plaza del Congreso when it happened. I barely heard any of the final speech by José Mayans*, partly because of the poor sound quality where I was standing (notably worse than for the previous speech by Anabel Fernández Sagasti, which was either a twist of fate or maybe just issues with Zoom), and partly because the majority of us had started to applaud, impatient, knowing that there was now no chance that the result would change. All that was left to do was wait for this sorrowful man to finish his address; like the swan song of a dying era, just one sad man, giving a pointless speech that no one was listening to. We listened to the votes, excited, already with our pañeulos in our hands, and we cried as the screens displayed the words, in green and in present tense – IT IS LAW. For a few minutes, we jumped up and down, hugging each other, but after less than half an hour, we started to leave. The crowd dispersed quickly and easily; most of us were very observant of the safety measures in place. I didn’t see people staying to dance or share a few beers. Besides, we were really exhausted.
 
I’ve been thinking about this fatigue, which stretches much further back than that Tuesday night and our lack of sleep. I do firmly believe that feminism has given all women far, far more than it has cost us. Each one of us has her own story. If I hadn’t found feminism, and had I not had the support of the women in my family to abandon the religion I was born into, I would be living a deeply unhappy life. Other women wouldn’t have had the friends that they have, others wouldn’t have managed to leave destructive relationships, or get a job that affords them some degree of economic independence, or a safe (albeit illegal) abortion. Stories of the “successes” of feminism are infinite. But in a world of machismo, being a feminist comes at a cost. When I say we’re tired, I think a lot of us are tired of this.
 
Those that think that feminism is “in vogue” perhaps aren’t aware that women, and those outside the sphere of heteronormativity, are constantly having to fight against barriers in a society where the structures of political and capital power are still patriarchal. We’ve had to fight to talk about sexual and reproductive health in contexts where our voices were not welcome. We had to fight when, while working in organisations with children and teenagers, we refused to condemn non-heterosexual behaviour and refused to label it as something to be “discussed at home.” We’ve had to fight to bring our pañuelos into educational institutions, businesses, the media. We have fought to defend ourselves and our sisters from dismissive treatment and disgusting remarks. We have fought in assemblies and various other political contexts to make our demands heard, so that feminist objectives weren’t just a footnote; so that abuse would not be tolerated in our spaces; so that we wouldn’t be just left painting our protest placards and so that our political organisations would take a stand on issues that mattered to us. We have fought with friends, with members of our families, with partners, with peers, with colleagues. There must be thousands more examples; I’m only talking about things that have happened to me and my friends in the last ten years. Or rather, when feminism was supposedly “in vogue.”
 
We often fought those battles, but equally, there were many times when we did not, because the fight is exhausting. Even the battles you win are exhausting. Even the battles you win earn you a reputation as being hysterical or annoying; the kind of situation in which you may have achieved your goal, but it does mean that people stop calling you. And of course, we don’t always have the luxury of being able to burn our bridges - some of us never can. There are bills to pay, there are ties we’re not prepared to break, contacts that would be too valuable to lose. In theory, we can choose what we do; in reality, that’s often not the case.
 
 And another thing we don’t say very often – even the battles we don’t fight are tiring. That project you abandoned because you know they won’t listen anyway; that conversation you don’t have because you know you have to pick your battles, and there’ll be another, more important argument down the line that you need to keep your strength for. That person you’ve stopped talking to because there’s no changing their mind and you can no longer face that level of aggression. That job you left because you can’t stand the harassment, or indeed, the indifference to it. The battles that you don’t fight stay with you as much as the those that you win and you lose, perhaps even more so.
 
Sara Ahmed talks about this in her book Living a Feminist Life when analysing the figure of “the feminist killjoy.” Ahmed reclaims this position of the angry feminist who rejects the ease and enjoyment that comes with being “pleasant”, and who refuses to participate in a general sense of cheer, when it comes at the expense of others. But Ahmed recognises that we can’t always be killjoys, as it comes at a cost; at times, it’s exhausting, it’s painful and it makes us feel that what we stand to lose is too valuable. I like that this is being recognised. I believe that we feminists are brave – we have to be – but it does give me a sense of relief, this affirmation that, sometimes, we just can’t face the fight, or we feel that we can’t, and that doesn’t make us bad feminists. Being vulnerable and sensitive doesn’t make us less brave. Needing to rest doesn’t make us less brave. Ahmed doesn’t use these words, but I think of it as a kind of therapeutic reframing of the way we see bravery. Being brave means raising your head above the parapet, and whoever does that, inevitably, gets hurt.
 
There’s a long way to go. There’s still so much to do before Latin America is fully feminist. Right here and now, we stand armed and ready for when the legal battles start happening, when there’s difficulties with the implementation of the law, and for the daily, invisible fights we’ll face when enforcing what we have achieved. But we deserve this happiness, we deserve this celebration, and this little bit of rest. Legislators, civil servants, activists and all those who lead feminist lives, in their houses, in schools, in universities, in their towns and in their neighbourhoods – raise a glass or put the kettle on.
 
*José Mayans is an Argentine Justicialist Party Politician. He was against the recent Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy Law that was passed in Argentina in December 2020, which allows elective terminations until the 14th week of pregnancy.

Translated by Molly Shevlin