The Day I Stopped Sewing

Earlier this year, two of my colleagues were killed in a car accident and I stopped sewing. I also stopped drinking for a while, which is odd in and of itself: I grew up in Denmark, and - like the Irish - we are known to drink to excess both in sadness and celebration. But it was the inability to sew that told me something was really wrong.

(A photo of my brother and me, probably the last year I wasn’t sewing. As you can see, however, we were really into coordinated outfits. I legit couldn’t say for sure which one is me and which one is my brother.)

Throughout my life, I have crafted items out of fabrics and yarn as a way to express and avoid emotions in equal measure.  During a painful breakup ten years ago, the first thing I did after that initial, disaster-defining, fight, was to dig out the most complicated pattern I could find and follow it to the letter, couture techniques and all. I still use the jacket I made - it is impeccably crafted, and it reminds me that beauty can grow out of pain.  When my estranged father tried to kill himself late last year, I moved in with my mother for a bit, and together we made a black-and-white quilt that mirrors the graphic oil paintings I remember from my childhood home. Every night I snuggle up in the soft cotton, knowing that home has meaning even when it is no longer there.

(OK, so this is not a quilt (in case you were wondering). This is a photo I found when I was looking through my father’s papers. This is my grandfather (the dude with the hat) and two queens. Except I think one might still have been a princess at the time.)

About five years ago, I discovered fabric design as an additional outlet. At the time, I was deeply unhappy in my job, a sentiment that translated into a temporary hatred of urbanity. The office was located in a particularly claustrophobic, downtrodden, and dingy part of New York City, and as a result I felt like I literally could only breathe when I was outdoors. I wanted to translate this feeling of relief - of life - into fabric, and so started printing flowers, snow, water, trees, pebbles, anything that helped me breathe, onto pieces of linen and cotton.

Before I knew it, the printing took on more importance than the sewing and design. My very first runway show was dominated by nature prints more so than coherent silhouettes. For a while, I didn’t make anything that didn’t carry my own prints. It felt like if I sewed anything with fabric I had not designed myself, it was somehow a cop-out, a lack of authenticity, a sadder, dimmer, carbon-copy of what I had imagined and felt.

In truth, for a short time there, fabric design and printing became the way I expressed pretty much anything, even petty spite and despair. When my father-in-law made hateful comments about immigrants (of which I am one) and immigrant children (of which I parent one), I translated my anger into marketable t-shirts and donated the proceeds in his name to a pro-immigrant organization. A miscarriage had me design another t-shirt with text expressing the flippancy I wanted to feel. The printing process prevented me from being a victim of the situation. I was doing something, and what I was doing had humor and grit. And then my colleagues died.

[Here’s a photo of my much missed colleague, Ana Paula, wearing one of Kær’s Kindness t-shirts. And one ofme wearing my miscarriage t-shirt.] I don’t know how to best explain that there is a clear before and after my colleagues’ deaths: there just is. And nowhere more so than in my creativity. It just went away. Sure, I sewed, but only realizing the vision of others. I made an impossibly romantic wedding gown for a friend’s friend, in a process that helped me focus love and loss in equal parts into tiny stitches of joy. I finally altered the many pants and jackets my husband long had begged me to outfit with zippers, hem, or otherwise make more useful. I raced through shirts I had promised my daughter to finish more than a year ago, but that somehow had been put on the backburner every time I had felt like realizing one of the colorful sketches that had been appearing in my mind.  Because after my colleagues died, the colorful sketches were just gone.

(Not everyone processes grief as loss of creativity. Here’s an amazing painting of our colleagues, Ana Paula and Sally, at a colleague organization in Honduras: Cattrachas.)

It’s been 8 months. This week I decided it was time. I pulled out a roll of fabric I designed years ago with oddly translucent cherry-red quince flowers on midnight blue. I picked a jacket pattern someone else made, complete with couture techniques and complicated twists. It will take weeks to make; the pockets alone took me a day. When I am done with the sewing, I will hand-wax it, transforming it from coarse linen into a leather-like shine. This process will also take days.  And when I am done, the sketches will come back. I know they will, because I can already see their shadows.

The birthplace of Kær: Samsø, the small island in the center of Denmark, where my mother lives and where I married the love of my life in 2014. This is where any creativity I have comes from: love

Demanding Abuse-Free Porn Is Great—But What About Everything Else We Buy?

@RHRealityCheck

Earlier this month, the European Parliament rejected a proposed ban on “all forms of pornography,” including online porn, throughout the continent. This news elicited a variety of reactions, including a piece by The Guardian contributor Tanya Gold, in which she argued that porn should be certified by a committee of “authentic feminists” before it is published—or, at the very least, consumers should learn how porn is made and where it comes from.

I am not sure what an “authentic feminist” is, and I do not particularly like the idea of someone with a specific mindset deciding what I get to see or read. I do, however, agree with the notion that we, as consumers, have a duty to try and ascertain if the products we buy are made in abusive or coercive situations.

But why only porn?

What about diamonds? Watchdog groups have long reported torture, slave-like situations, and the use of child labor in diamond mines in several countries, including Zimbabwe and Sierra Leone. Profits from diamond mines have fueled conflicts for decades, contributing to the deaths of thousands of civilians. Yet the diamond market continues to grow, both worldwide and in the United States. In the United States, this is likely linked to the fact that many women, for reasons I cannot fathom, find getting married without a sizeable diamond engagement ring objectionable, if not impossible. In fact, over 80 percent of U.S. women who get married receive a diamond engagement ring, averaging over $3,000 a piece. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the most frequent question women ask about engagement rings is “How much did it cost?”—not “Was anyone harmed while producing this?”

And how about shoes? A recent study released by Stop Child Labor examined 28 shoe-producing companies and found that at least eight used child labor at some point in their supply chain. Moreover, the study concluded that none of the 28 companies could guarantee that child labor was not used in their production chain, because they only supervise the final link in that chain. But how many of us first think about child labor when we see a gorgeous pair of heels or go shopping for new sneakers?

The same is true for chocolate. As a recent Oxfam campaign documented, women who pick cocoa beans used in products manufactured by the world’s largest chocolate companies are regularly subjected to labor rights abuses, including low pay, excessively long hours, and sex discrimination. Cocoa sold with the Fair Trade label, which guarantees a certain level of pay and labor rights, represents only about 0.5 percent of the current cocoa market worldwide. So it’s fair to assume that very few people think about such worker conditions before they buy a candy bar.

I’ve deliberately mentioned products that are indulgences, because none of us needs diamonds, chocolate, or multiple pairs of shoes. So in these cases, it would be possible for us to ask the right questions and refrain from buying products fueled by abuse. But most of us do not. Why is that?

One reason is transparency. As in the case of the shoe suppliers, it’s not always possible to determine whether a shoe company sources its products using child labor, because watchdog groups cannot always see through the multiple supply chain links. Sometimes even the companies themselves have a hard time with that.

Another reason is convenience. I know environmentalist vegans who smoke, ignoring what tobacco farming does to the environment and farm workers. And I know Fair Trade lobbyists who drink Diet Coke like it’s water, even though Coca-Cola and its subsidiaries have had their share of alleged child labor issues. In short, I know any number of people who choose to examine some of the products they consume in detail but leave the rest alone. I am OK with that. As someone clever once said, the examined life is no picnic. We all choose our battles.

This does not mean governments can abdicate their responsibility to implement and enforce human and labor rights. And it does not mean that we shouldn’t demand transparency in sourcing for everything we consume. Pornography, like shoes and diamonds and chocolate, should be abuse-free.

It does, however, mean that it is hypocritical to demand abuse-free products only for things we don’t use or like. In her piece, Tanya Gold compares porn to meat (another product we don’t really need), arguing that we should demand the same transparency for both. I say we should demand transparency for all products and then leave people to decide which, of the abuse-free alternatives, they want to consume.

TV Recognizes the “Modern Family”—Why Not Governments?

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I don’t watch “Modern Family,” the prime-time sitcom depicting “non-traditional”—e.g., same-sex, interracial, and inter-generational—couples. Still, I’m struck by how fast family realities change and how slowly laws and societal perceptions about what’s “right” reflect those changes.

The couples depicted in “Modern Family” were surely seen by society at large as more unusual in 2009, when the show first aired, than even just five years later. Today, the U.S. Supreme Court is considering two cases that might pave the way for federal benefits for same-sex couples, the number of interracial marriages is steadily growing, and the combination of reproductive technologies, longer life-spans, and the normalization of serial monogamy has taken age somewhat out of the equation when it comes to forming a family.

Even so, real-life individuals in same-sex couples, or those who live with someone of a different race or generation from themselves, often face daily struggles to protect their families from legal uncertainty and publicly articulated disgust. Depending on where we live, our intimate lives and families may be subject to criminal sanctions, unequal legal protections, scrutiny, shaming, and belittling.

Often, the protection of our families in law—while welcome—does not mean we are immune to community shaming and violence. In Latin America, for example, a wave of new marriage equality laws has not yet had an impact on pervasive community violence against LGBTI individuals. And though it is more than 45 years since the Supreme Court invalidated the prohibition of interracial marriage in Loving v. Virginia, prejudices against interracial couples—in particular where one of the partners is Black—are expressed frequently in social media and in some cases result in discrimination.

This tug-of-war between perceptions, laws, and reality expresses itself clearly where courts have to decide to what extent legislators get to put their own—or their constituents’—prejudices before principles of equality and facts about child welfare.

This week, the European Court on Human Rights issued a ruling in one such case. The court held that Austria had violated human rights by denying two lesbian women a proper evaluation of their adoption petition. One of the women had petitioned to adopt the biological son of her female partner, a child they both had been parenting since infancy.

The Austrian government argued that its adoption laws are based on the notion that all children ideally grow up with a father and a mother. The European Court on Human Rights countered that this vision does not adequately protect child welfare and certainly is not enough to implement discriminatory laws. So far, so good.

However, the case also permitted subjective perceptions of what a family should be to persist in the law. In this week’s ruling, the European Court highlighted the fact that Austria allows unmarried different-sex couples to adopt each other’s children, whereas unmarried same-sex couples cannot (and same-sex couples are not yet allowed to marry in Austria). Had Austria reserved adoption for those who are married and marriage for those who are straight, a close read of the ruling indicates that the court might have allowed this; after all, the Court had allowed precisely this set-up in a 2012 ruling involving France.

To be sure, governments have the mandate, and even the obligation, to encourage family structures that benefit society generally and children more specifically. And the laws and policies that flow from this mandate must to some extent be subjective. The state may, for example, believe that marriage has a value in and of itself, and not only as it relates to parental and economic stability, and, as such, seek to promote marriage through tax structures and inheritance laws.

But beliefs only go so far. The obligation of the state to protect the human rights of both children and adults must find its expression through science and facts. One fact is that same-sex couples and LGBTI individuals already parent children. Another, that the welfare of children correlates with parental support and love, and not with the parents’ sexual orientation, race, identity, or age.

But the overarching fact that governments across the world should address immediately is that there are any number of “modern families” who are discriminated against by law and ostracized in their communities.

Potential SCOTUS Review of DOMA Presents Pivotal Moment for Gay Rights in America

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On Friday, November 30th (or today as you read this), the US Supreme Court judges are expected to announce which, if any, cases related to gay rights they will review. At stake are not only the right to marry and federal recognition of marriage-related financial benefits for same-sex couples who are already married. The cases before the Court touch upon our understanding of “the family” as an essential building block of society, and whether we can reasonably expect individuals to put part of who they are on hold in order to be considered worthy citizens.

The Supreme Court has been asked to review the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (known as DOMA), a piece of legislation which was signed into law by Bill Clinton in 1996, and which forbids the recognition of same-sex marriages for the purposes of federal benefits such as tax breaks, social security survivor benefits, and estate tax.

DOMA also prohibits married same-sex couples from benefitting from the same immigration rights as married opposite-sex couples, leading to the summary denial of green cards to foreign spouses of U.S. citizens and permanent residents merely because they are not straight. But in June this year, the US Board of Immigration Appeals sent four such cases back to immigration authorities to determine whether the marriages are valid under state law and whether those marriages would qualify for immigration purposes in the absence of DOMA.

Those decisions follow Obama’s early 2011 announcement that his administration would no longer defend the constitutionality of DOMA. In fact, the Board of Immigrations Appeals’ decision appear at least in part to be made in preparation for a, hopefully not too distant, post-DOMA world. But until this law is declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, or repealed by Congress, DOMA will remain force.

Opponents of the federal recognition of same-sex marriage benefits at times phrase their view as a defense of “the family” as the basic building block of society, implicitly or explicitly noting that only opposite-sex couples with or without children also are worthy of state protection as inherently “good.”

And several international and regional human rights documents do, indeed, establish the “family” as a fundamental group unit of society, and, in particular, as essential in the upbringing of children and the protection of the rights of the child. 

However, the definition of what a family might look like to qualify for state protection is deliberately broad and inclusive. In 2006, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child clarified that when it talks about “family,” it means any number of arrangements, including same-sex families. In February this year, the Inter-American Court on Human Rights expressed a similar notion: “The Court confirms that the American Convention does not define a limited concept of family, nor does it only protect a “traditional” model of the family.”

More to the point, perhaps, study after study has dis-proven that an opposite-sex nuclear family is the only appropriate unit for bringing up children, and more than a third of children in the United States now live in single parent households and same-sex families.

Of course, this is not about marriage in the abstract, but rather about the benefits we assign to married couples, concretely, through the law. It is precisely because marital relationship are prioritized in law that same-sex couples would benefit tremendously from being allowed to marry in the first place, and to obtain federal tax, social security, and inheritance benefits when they do. If no marital relationships were given special status under the law, the impact of DOMA might be less stark on both adults and children.

It is unlikely that the Supreme Court judges will challenge this general privilege in law. But we can hope they decide to look at the suffering its unequal implementation causes.

Bloomberg's Breastfeeding Initiative: Let's Start With Paid Parental Leave....

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New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has again been the focus of criticism for promoting a “nanny state,” this time for his initiative to further breastfeeding by preventing hospitals from displaying and promoting breast milk substitutes. The many voices in the outpouring of criticism that followed the unveiling of Bloomberg’s new plan are right about one thing: most women's decision to breastfeed is not determined by where and whether hospitals display breast milk substitutes on their shelves. But most criticism has focused on a somewhat illusionary notion: choice.

And by this I don't mean that women in the United States have no choice in the matter: obviously, we do.

What I mean is that choices, everywhere, are determined by our circumstances. When a substantially larger percentage of women in Western European countries, as compared to the United States, consistently choose to breastfeed and to continue to breastfeed past 3 months, logic has it that circumstances in those countries facilitate the healthier choice (which, undisputedly, in most cases is continued and exclusive breastfeeding for at least 6 months).

And what are those circumstances?

Here's a hint: it's not that European countries hide breast milk substitutes on the back shelves far away from maternity wards. Sure, many hospitals in Europe aggressively discourage bottle-feeding, but breast milk substitutes are freely available and the shaming of non-breastfeeding mothers—which many critics of Bloomberg's initiative rightly point to as counterproductive—is no more or less strong than in the United States.

The fact that more women breastfeed in Europe is also not an indication of European women lagging behind their American sisters in terms of emancipation and modern living. If true, this might make European women more likely to live traditional homemaker lives with time to breastfeed. Women in Europe face different, not more, obstacles to equality than women in the United States. The pay gap between men and women has long been less pronounced in Europe than in the United States, whereas legal protections against sexual harassment are stronger in the United States than in most European countries.

Many of those who criticize Bloomberg's initiative refer to the fact that some women just can’t breastfeed, and they shouldn’t be made to think they are lesser or worse mothers because of it. And, yes, that is obviously an issue. Some women just do not produce milk, regardless of how long and how well they teach their newborns to suckle. But it would be facile (and, frankly, naïve) to conclude from the difference in breastfeeding statistics that substantially fewer women living in the United States are physically able to breastfeed. There is, after all, nothing in the water (one would hope) that so systematically impairs our bodily functions.

There is, however, something in our laws. The key difference between Europe and the United States when it comes to breastfeeding are legal protections of paid parental leave, paid sick leave, and, in some cases allowances for longer lunch hours to breastfeed.

Consider this: in Denmark, where I gave birth and started breastfeeding my daughter, women have a right to at least 46 weeks paid leave after birth (unless your union got you a better deal). After living seven months in Peru (where women are entitled by law to 90 days paid leave to be taken before or after birth, and an additional one-hour break for breastfeeding while at work until the new baby is six months old), I moved to the United States for a full-time job. My daughter was then eight months old and had until then been exclusively breastfed.

My conditions were comparatively good. I had an office with a lock on the door, and I could organize my meetings and other work around the regular pumping I needed to do to maintain the flow of milk. Crucially, there was a fridge where I could store the pumped milk to later bring home to my daughter. Even so, my milk production, which
had until then been copious, all but seized in a few months, largely due to the difficulties in keeping a rigorously regular pumping (and water intake) schedule and—who am I kidding—the physical discomfort the pumping caused. And I am not alone. Many women find it hard to keep up a steady breast milk supply when returning to work after time at home.

So imagine what might happen to a new mother without such discretionary protection, and with only the narrow extended (and unpaid) sick leave afforded by the law. She'd be back to work after 12 weeks (or less) of unpaid leave, often have no place to pump, no allowance for time to pump, and no place to store the milk.

Equally to the point, the oddly myopic view of what's at stake in the breastfeeding debate that was displayed in last week's criticism of Bloomberg's initiative suggests that new mothers enjoy little understanding from co-workers, employers, or even those claiming to represent women's best interests.

At best, we are encouraged to feel empowered in rejecting breastfeeding and Mayor Bloomberg's blame politics. At worst, we are told bottle-feeding is the price we pay for equality. The former is a limited read of reality, while the latter is just plain wrong. There are more effective ways than blame and coercion to encourage healthy breastfeeding for women who want to lactate and are physically able to do so, starting with paid parental leave.