In the late 1990s, Rose Mapendo lost her family and home to the violence that engulfed the Democratic Republic of Congo. She emerged advocating forgiveness and reconciliation. In a country where ethnic violence has created seemingly irreparable rifts among Tutsis, Hutus and other Congolese, this remarkable woman is a vital voice in her beleaguered nation’s search for peace. Now, Rose is confronted with teaching one her most recalcitrant students how to forgive–Nangabire, the daughter who remained behind.
The LA Times calls the film “heart-wrenching but ultimately uplifting,” and Variety says “[t]he strength of Pushing the Elephant lies in the way it brings this larger-than-life inspirational figure into the everyday domestic realm, where activism becomes a function less of heroic destiny than of conscious choice, open to anyone.”
Eve Ensler is famous for talking about vaginas. Specifically talking about the ways that they can be loved, abused and misunderstood in her her play “The Vagina Monologues” which has been performed around the world.
Her most recent book, “I Am an Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around the World,” was released earlier this year and today MTV is launching an advertising campaign designed to raise awareness of teenage abuse that is based on parts of the book. The tireless activist, who is currently battling uterine cancer, is also prepping an off-Broadway play based on the book that she hopes to launch in the Fall.
She took time out from rehearsals of the play to talk to Speakeasy about stopping teenage abuse, Sarah Palin, and writing about boys.
The Wall Street Journal: Tell me about what you’re doing with MTV.
Eve Ensler: For a long time we at V Day [Ensler’s anti-violence organization] have been trying to find a way to do something with MTV and its younger audience. When “Emotional Creature” came out it seemed like the perfect time to do something. Writers used the text of the book to bring out core issues teens are dealing with such as teen dating , sexting and abuse but doing it in a way that isn’t finger wagging.
Do you watch a lot of MTV?
I don’t really watch television. Up until recently, because I’ve been recovering from cancer, I’ve been on the road. In the last month I’ve been watching more programming than usual.
In my experience, having done “Emotional Creatures”, there is a lot of abuse in the teen age community particularly towards girls. You have girls giving blow jobs in homeroom who don’t even know it’s sex.
Wait, aren’t homerooms kind of small for that? Wouldn’t people stare?
That’s the thing. People are staring. There are these strange movements backwards as we move forwards where bodies have become commodified.
Some of the videos and shows on MTV and its many properties don’t always portray women in a positive light. How do you reconcile working with them?
Because I want to change that. You can say ‘Oh, they’re doing horrible things’ and just walk away from that. Or you can do something. The idea is to get different messages into a culture that is becoming increasingly horrible to women.
Most of your work has been focused on girls and women. Have you ever thought of doing something on boys and men?
In the last few years I’ve begun to talk to boys. There’s an incredible pressure on boys over what it means to be a boy. It’s gotten me interested in boys and men and I’m pondering doing something on them. I’ve been on the other side of the equation for so long, with the impact of violence on women and girls. What I’m interested in is the why. What’s going on and what’s the story that’s lead us here? To keep being angry and protesting and resisting when we haven’t joined with men seems kind of ludicrous.
You’ve spent time in some of the worst places on earth and heard horrifying tales of violence. What kind of effect does that have on you?
There are a couple of effects. One is that I think it shatters me the kind of violence being done to women. The shattering opened something in me where I came to understand violence against women and girls is the most important thing I could be working on. If you don’t honor, respect and cherish women you don’t honor, respect and cherish life itself. I don’t think my sickness [uterine cancer] is disassociated from spending time listening to those stories but at the same time it’s inspired and motivated me to change things. I wake up every morning saying ‘Do I really have problem?” when I think about what women are going through in the Congo or Haiti or Afghanistan.
You were criticized by some for lambasting Sarah Palin’s positions, particularly on global warming. What was the fall out?
I got more letters from my piece on Sarah Palin than on anything I’ve ever written. At the time Palin was saying global warming doesn’t exist and that creationism was real. I will have more to say about Sarah Palin in the future.
MTV AND EVE ENSLER PARTNER TO BRING
“I AM AN EMOTIONAL CREATURE: THE SECRET LIFE OF GIRLS AROUND THE WORLD” TO LIFE ON AIR
Rosario Dawson, Aubrey Plaza and Jessica Stroup
Address Sex, Abuse and Love in the Digital Age
in a Series of Provocative New Spots
New York, NY, July 29, 2010 – Today, MTV began rolling out a series of new spots that bring Eve Ensler’s critically-acclaimed, New York Times bestseller I Am an Emotional Creature: the Secret Life of Girls Around the World to life on MTV and MTV.com. Rosario Dawson, Aubrey Plaza (“Parks and Recreation”) and Jessica Stroup (“90210”) give voice to the legendary playwright and activist’s work, tackling hot button teen issues including safe sex, sexual pressure, sexting, constant connectedness and dating abuse.
“I am thrilled to be part of this project with MTV where girls and the empowerment and protection of girls are front and center,” said Eve Ensler. “It’s really been a pleasure helping put a new “V” in MTV.”
Many of the themes in Eve’s new book directly connect to two of MTV’s core campaigns: It’s Your (Sex) Life (www.itsyoursexlife.com), built to support young people in making better and more responsible decisions about their sexual health, and A THIN LINE (www.athinline.org), which empowers young people to draw their own line between digital use and digital abuse.
“Eve Ensler started a revolution with ‘The Vagina Monologues,’ and her latest book carries that legacy forward – powerfully articulating the passions, fears and resiliency of girls today,” said Jason Rzepka, Vice President of Public Affairs for MTV. “We’re proud to amplify this important work and believe it will spark conversation, encourage members of our audience to honor themselves and know they have the right to be emotional creatures.”
The new spots include:
“You Tell Me How To Be a Girl In 2010,” where Aubrey Plaza discusses what it means to be young and dating in an environment where you’re constantly connected.
“I Dance,” where Jessica Stroup confronts the pressures of being a teen girl today, including sexting, and the need to escape from the stresses of the modern world.
The monologue “Dear Rihanna,” which captures the troubling reaction of many young women who have been the victims of dating violence, and have excused it.
“Asking the Question,” where Aubrey Plaza talks about asking the question… the prophylactic one, that is, and shows the audience that navigating this awkward moment doesn’t have to be quite so hard.
The monologue “It’s Not a Baby, it’s a Maybe,” which explores what can happen when only selectively applying abstinence.
In addition, MTV.com will exclusively premiere interviews with Eve Ensler and V-Day Board member Rosario Dawson talking frankly about their mission, through V-Day, a global movement to end violence against women and girls, to encourage young women to know their bodies, respect themselves, own their feelings and make their own choices.
To check out this series of short programming, read monologues from these works, or watch interviews with Eve Ensler and Rosario, please head to http://www.emotionalcreature.mtv.com.
V-Day
Founded by playwright/performer/activist Eve Ensler, V-Day is a global movement to end violence against women and girls. Made up of original monologues about and for girls, I Am an Emotional Creature aims to inspire girls to take agency over their minds, bodies, hearts and curiosities. In conjunction, V-Day has developed V-Girls to engage young women in its “empowerment philanthropy” model, igniting their activism and providing them with a platform to amplify their voices. In early 2010, readings of the book were staged in over fifteen pilot locations, where teen girls engaged in the creative process, accompanied by a specially written curriculum addressing the issues in the book. This summer, the V-Girls Book Club program launched, enabling girls and their educators to explore I Am an Emotional Creature, reflect and discuss the text, and respond to it creatively through art. The accompanying book guide will provide opportunities for girls to write and share their own monologues inspired by the book, develop visual and performance art events, and find their own creative ways to speak out on issues that matter to them. Visit v-girls.org.
A THIN LINE
MTV’s “A THIN LINE” (www.athinline.org), campaign empowers America’s youth to identify, respond to, and stop the spread of digital abuse. Digital abuse is an emerging issue that includes behaviors like sexting, sexting, cyber-bullying and digital dating abuse, which affect a large majority of young people today. Young people today are growing up in an environment unlike anything previous generations have experienced. Because they are constantly connected through technologies like cell phones, texting, Facebook, etc. – they are experiencing a range of new issues including pressure to send nude photos, to be available online and via text message 24/7, cyberbullying, and more. MTV built a coalition of the foremost authorities on these topics, and is addressing these issues through thought-provoking PSAs, integration into MTV’s top-rated shows, innovative online and mobile tools, and curricula. To date, A THIN LINE has already led over 400,000 to take positive action.
It’s Your (Sex) Life
For over a decade, MTV has been addressing sexual health issues through its Emmy and Peabody-winning “It’s Your (Sex) Life” campaign, which encourages young people to make responsible decisions about their sexual health. Since 1997, the Kaiser Family Foundation and MTV have worked together on this extensive public information partnership to address HIV/AIDs, other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and related sexual health issues. Touching on topics ranging from unintended pregnancy to safe sex and HIV and STD Testing, the campaign has reached over 200 million young people since launch. The partnership includes targeted public service advertisements (PSAs), entertainment and other special programming, news segments, and free resources, including an informational guide developed especially for the campaign, and an extensive website www.itsyoursexlife.com.
About MTV:
MTV is the dynamic, vibrant experiment at the intersection of music, creativity and youth culture. For over 28 years, MTV has evolved, challenged the norm, and detonated boundaries — giving each new generation a creative outlet and voice that entertains, informs and unites on every platform and screen. On-air, MTV is the number one full day-ad supported network for P12-24. Online, MTV.com averaged 24.5 million monthly unique visitors during the second quarter of 2010 — up +13% year-over-year. Average video streams for the second quarter of 2010 increased +8% from Q1/2010. And MTV’s successful sibling networks MTV2 and mtvU each deliver unprecedented customized content, super-serving young males, music fans, and college students like no one else. MTV is part of MTV Networks, a unit of Viacom (NYSE: VIA, VIA.B), one of the world’s leading creators of programming and content across all media platforms. Wanna know more? Come on in… www.mtvpress.com
TICKETS ON SALE NOW for Swimming Upstream at the Apollo Theater in New York and at the Mahalia Jackson Theater in New Orleans, featuring Shirley Knight, and a New Orleans Cast.
Written by 16 New Orleans’ women, Swimming Upstream is a powerful theatrical production that tells the raw and soulful stories of women who lived through the flood with grace, rage and great resiliency, punctuated by a flair for story telling, humor and music that comes from being New Orleanian.
Directed by Eve Ensler, this two-night only production features performances by Troi Bechet, Asali Njeri DeVan, Anne-Liese Juge Fox, Karen-kaia Livers and singers Michaela A. Harrison, Leslie Blackshear Smith and featuring Shirley Knight.* With generous support from the Rockefeller Foundation and The Culture Project.
Swimming Upstream premiered in April 2008 at V-Day’s “V To The Tenth” celebration and enjoyed a subsequent sold-out run in Atlanta in November 2008.
The financial regulation bill that President Obama will sign into law on Wednesday is supposed to clean up Wall Street. But an obscure passage buried deep in the 2,300-page legislation aims to transform a very different place — eastern Congo, labeled the “rape capital of the world.”
The passage, tucked into the bill’s “Miscellaneous Provisions,” will require thousands of U.S. companies to disclose what steps they are taking to ensure that their products, including laptops, cellphones and medical devices, don’t contain “conflict minerals” from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The sale of such minerals has fueled a nearly 15-year war that has been marked by a horrific epidemic of sexual violence.
The issue of “conflict minerals” was barely mentioned during congressional debate on the Wall Street bill. But it has attracted growing concern from an unlikely alliance of conservatives and liberals — from Sen. Sam Brownback ((R-Kan.) to feminist Eve Ensler, author of “The Vagina Monologues.” Activists hope to ultimately see an international system for curbing the trade, such as the one that has slowed the sale of “blood diamonds” from West Africa.
“This is one of those issues that is below the radar for about 99.9 percent of Americans. . . . Everyone has their cellphone up against their ear, nobody is thinking of Congo or conflict minerals. But everybody’s got some, potentially, right next to their ear,” said Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), speaking recently at the Center for American Progress.
Although little noticed by the public, the provision in the regulatory bill could have a broad impact. It applies not only to electronics companies, which are major users of Congolese tantalum, but also to all publicly traded U.S. firms that use tin and gold.
“This is a law that is going to affect virtually the entire U.S. manufacturing sector,” said Rick Goss, vice president of environment at the Information Technology Industry Council.
Charting new territory
Congo “conflict minerals” law is the first of its kind in the world, Goss said. European governments are pondering similar steps, even as U.S. officials and industry experts caution that the murky nature of the conflict makes it difficult to trace the minerals.
The war in Congo began after the 1994 genocide in neighboring Rwanda, which sent streams of militiamen across the border. An estimated 5 million people have died since in mineral-rich eastern Congo, in one of the bloodiest conflicts since World War II. Hundreds of thousands of women have been sexually assaulted in what U.N. envoy Margot Wallstrom referred to in April as the world’s “rape capital.”
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Congolese activists, U.N. experts and nongovernmental groups have become increasingly concerned that armed Congolese groups are financing themselves with minerals such as gold and the “three T’s” — tin, tungsten and tantalum. The minerals are extracted from remote Congolese mines and smuggled to neighboring countries.
Congo is the source for an estimated one-fifth of the world’s tantalum, as well as smaller percentages of the other three minerals.
During her trip to Congo last year, in which she held an emotional meeting with rape victims, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called for greater international action to stem the flow of the minerals.
The issue got tied to the financial reform bill largely because of Brownback, who had previously introduced legislation on “conflict minerals.” He sought to attach an amendment to the bill, and Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn), chairman of the banking committee, supported it, congressional staff said. In the end, Brownback voted against the overall bill, but his amendment survived.
The new law requires American companies to submit an annual report to the Securities and Exchange Commission disclosing whether their products contain gold, tin, tungsten or tantalum from Congo or adjacent countries. If so, they have to describe what measures they are taking to trace the minerals’ origin.
The law does not impose any penalty on companies who report taking no action. But the disclosures must be made publicly on firms’ Web sites.
“The consequence is a market-driven one. Consumers can make their choices. Do they want their electronic products to be funding gang rape in central Africa? I don’t think most Americans would want that,” said Rory Anderson of the World Vision humanitarian group, which has been pushing for the legislation.
‘We need to toughen up’
U.S. executives say it can be exceedingly difficult to figure out whether there are “conflict minerals” in their products. Such minerals may, for example, be smuggled from Congo through Rwanda, mixed with ore from other countries in a smelter in Kazakhstan and then sold to a company in Southeast Asia that supplies a parts manufacturer in China.
Many firms in the high-tech sector have been trying to ensure their suppliers don’t use “conflict minerals,” jointly running a pilot program at smelters to identify where minerals come from.
Robert Hormats, the undersecretary of state for economic affairs, said in an interview that tracing the source of minerals is much more complicated than tracing the source of diamonds. For one thing, he said, diamonds “aren’t melted down.” In addition, the rebels sometimes gain or lose control over mines.
Still, the State and Treasury departments are examining possible sanctions against U.S. companies that use “conflict minerals.”
“We need to toughen up. Sanctions is one way,” said Hormats, who has been working with industry to improve accountability.
Some companies said they welcomed the law. Michael Holston, the general counsel of HP, the Palo Alto, Calif.-based computer maker, applauded the measure, saying it would “help reduce some of the factors that have contributed to the civil war” in Congo.
Both industry experts and advocates said the law is one step in solving a much larger conflict.
“What really needs to happen is the international community needs to redouble its efforts to bring an overall diplomatic [solution] to what’s going on in Congo,” Goss said.
This year, Powerhouse Theater, a collaboration between Vassar College and New York Stage and Film, will feature a one-night only reading of Eve Ensler’s I Am An Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around The World.
WHEN: Thursday, July 29, at 8:00pm
WHERE: Powerhouse Theater, 124 Raymond Avenue, Poughkeepsie, NY 12604 Directions >
TICKETS: Free to the public with reservations strongly recommended.
Call the box office at (845) 437-5599. Reservations open to the general public on July 27. Advanced sales available for Powerhouse Subscribers July 23 – 25.
Calling all Emotional Creatures… Start a V-Girls Book Club in your community this summer! Download our free V-Girls Book Club Guide and share I Am an Emotional Creature with your friends. We give you everything you need to organize your group, read together, and dish about the monologues and issues that matter to you.
And guess what? You don’t have to be a teen OR a girl to organize a book club. If you are an emotional creature at heart, the V-Girls Book Club is for you!
V-Day distributes funds to grassroots, national and international organizations and programs that work to stop violence against women and girls around the world. Violence against women affects one in three women in the U.S and the world, your tax deductible donation of $25, $50, $100, $500, or more will help V-Day end violence against women!
PLEASE NOTE: V-Cards are sent by email immediately. Click on the link above to send your v-card on the same day you would like it to be received.
Give the gift of V-Day – Your gift, in honor of your loVed one, will be put to work through V-Day’s program partners who are working on-the-ground to address the most critical issues facing women around the world.
A New Yorker who turned a play into an international movement is continuing her life’s mission one chapter at a time. NY1’s Budd Mishkin filed the following “One On 1” report.
If not for Eve Ensler, a certain word might still be scarce on television.
“When we started doing the play 15 or 16, you couldn’t say vagina on television. You could say penis, but you couldn’t say vagina. Now I turn on the television, it’s just ‘vagina, vagina’ everywhere,” says Ensler.
The play is “The Vagina Monologues,” a series of stories first staged by Ensler in 1996 in small venues Downtown. It’s become an international phenomenon, performed in dozens of languages around the world.
“If you had told me 16 years ago that I would write this little play, way, way downtown New York and that this season there would be 5,000 productions in 900 places around the planet? No way!” says Ensler.
The success of “The Vagina Monologues,” including an Obie award in 1997 and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1999, led to the creation of V Day, a global organization aimed at stopping violence against women and girls. Ensler has spent much of the last 15 years traveling, hearing their stories.
“Being in Narok, Kenya where we have a safehouse where girls run away and they prevent themselves from having their clitoris cut off and they get to go to school and they aren’t forced into marriage,” says Ensler.
Since the success of “The Vagina Monologues,” Ensler has written several plays, including “The Good Body,” written in prose, and led a writing group at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women, a group portrayed in the documentary “What I Want My Words To Do To You.”
Her latest work is “I Am An Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around the World.” It’s a series of writings based on the stories told to Ensler during her global travels, using a format similar to “The Vagina Monologues.” So how does one avoid the trap of repeating their most famous work?
“To try to replicate that? I wouldn’t even know where to begin, because I don’t really feel like I had much to do with it in the first place,” explains Ensler.
Ensler says that V Day is a grassroots movement, involving thousands in 130 countries. V Day and “The Vagina Monologues” have attracted the participation of actresses like Rosario Dawson, Selma Hayek and Rosie Perez — attention which has helped raise more than $75 million for programs around the world. Her work often requires transitioning between two very different worlds — the despair she sees and hears about on the road, and the calm of her Manhattan apartment.
Budd Mishkin: Does it ever create moments where you feel guilty about enjoying a nice meal?
Eve Ensler: Always, always. You can’t go and spend a month in the Congo and come back and not feel terrible. There’s no way. There’s no way. How do we live with both worlds at the same time?
Eve Ensler has made her name by telling others’ stories. But the passion to fight violence against women stems from her own story.
“There is something about breaking your own silence and breaking your own taboos and breaking your own insidious connection to your past that’s crucial in getting on to the next stages of your life,” says Ensler.
Ensler says she was sexually and physically abused by her father when she was a child. Her father died in the early 90s. She says she now has compassion for him.
“I look at my father, and I think, now, ‘What happened to him, that he was so angry? What happened to him, that he could beat up and be so cruel to his own child?’ Like, ‘How? How do you do that? That is much more interesting to me, now, than me being his forever victim. I don’t feel like anyone’s victim anymore,” says Ensler.
One On 1: Eve Ensler Shares Personal Monologue
Growing up in Scarsdale, Eve Ensler drew inspiration from several writers. But the biggest pedestal was reserved for a musician — the Jefferson Airplane’s Grace Slick.
Ensler has made a career out of speaking what was previously unspoken. But when she had a chance to talk to her hero while working on a television show years ago, she froze.
“I was sitting here, and Grace Slick was sitting there. And I was just like ‘Oh my God. That is Grace Slick.’ Immobilized. Nothing,” recalls Ensler.
But there was nothing funny about Ensler’s early years, which she says included abusive relationships, drugs and alcohol.
“I was in such a destructive course in my life. The fact that it turned around, the fact that I got to be here, the fact that I have any life at all, is such a miracle,” says Ensler.
Ensler came to New York in the mid 1970s to write. She also engaged in a lot of political activism, once dressing up as a nuclear bomb at an anti-nuke rally.
Budd Mishkin: So you’re going up to the library to be a nuclear bomb. Subway? Taxi? Get dressed there?
Eve Ensler: I think it was subways and we put it on there.
Her focus was on politics and writing and volunteering at a homeless shelter. But as for family…
“I never wanted to be a mother. I never wanted to be a biological mother. I just never hungered for that. It just didn’t interest me,” says Ensler.
But in 1978, she married Richard McDermott, and officially adopted his son, actor Dylan McDermott, who was only eight years younger than Ensler.
“The best experience of my life. I mean, raising Dylan and being Dylan’s mother. I mean, Dylan really taught me how to love,” says Ensler.
Ensler says she doesn’t regret anything about those early years in New York as a struggling writer. But her life clearly changed when she wrote “The Vagina Monologues,” and not just professionally.
“Often when you’ve been abused, you separate from your body and you separate from your sexuality and you separate from your power. And you’re very disassociated from it. And I think the process of ‘The Vagina Monologues’ allowed me to re-associate with myself,” says Ensler.
The play connected with women on an intensely personal level, through serious monologues and comedy, like the recitation of pet names for the vagina.
One On 1: Eve Ensler Shares Personal Monologue
“The Vagina Monologues” was staged around the world. But it was criticized for having little or nothing positive to say about men or heterosexual relationships.
“It’s not just a piece about bad men. On the other hand, I will say that I interviewed hundreds of women. The fabulous stories about men were not pouring through the door, or I would have written that,” explains Ensler.
But the monologue that received the most criticism involved a line from a woman fondly recalling a sexual encounter she had as a girl with an older woman.
“I was suddenly in this position where I had a woman saying, ‘If it was a rape, it was a good rape.’ Which was so politically at odds with this movement to end violence,” recalls Ensler. “So I went through this enormous struggle in my two selves, between my art self and my activist self, and really debated it for two years, and finally made the decision to change it.”
Eve Ensler has made a life out of listening to the stories and struggles of women from Harlem to Islamabad. And her own struggle is never far removed.
“My life was such a difficult life at the beginning. It was so difficult, everything about it. Then to get to have this life in the same life feels completely crazy,” says Ensler. “To watch women on this planet who are in the face of poverty and who are in the face of suffering and who are in the face of so much violence, creating paths for other people, making life better for somebody else. To know those people? Doesn’t get better than that.”
This past weekend, Ensler announced that she was recently diagnosed with uterine cancer and is now recovering from surgery and chemotherapy.
The article she wrote announcing her cancer contrasted her situation, which she calls arbitrary, with the rape and murder of women in the Congo, which she calls “systematic, strategic and intentional.”
This year, Powerhouse Theater, a collaboration between Vassar College and New York Stage and Film, will feature a one-night only reading of Eve Ensler’s I Am An Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around The World.