In general, as soon as we are born, people socialize in one way or another according to what they involve: as women the alienated and as men the people with penis. This establishes the gender rule based on binarism, with all the violence that comes to it: it tries to accommodate this bilaterality both genitals, in the case of intersexuals, as well as individuals, so that there is no more than men and women. Socialization and education based on gender stereotypes is a fundamental element in all this, educating men in concrete values and women in others, favoring the sub-teaching of the latter. It is a clear example of what sociologist Pierre Bourdieu called symbolic violence: ideological beliefs themselves induce the individual as their own characteristics, favoring the reproduction of concrete social roles and status, convinced that it is “natural” – the ability of men and the kitchen for sport for women, or the taste of the former for cars and the latter for children, for example. A social structure based on inequality and oppression is essential to remain intact.

Its weight in all this is, to a large extent, a source of contradictions and conflicts for feminism. In fact, in a female role based on gender stereotypes, motherhood is central: as if the reproductive capacity that is predicted to be born with the uterus determines it, they are made to understand from an early age that being mothers and caring is their destiny. For, although motherhood is much more late than the birth of patriarchy and the domination of capitalism, the system has been able to take advantage of it for the benefit of its own interests: among other things, with the idea that being a mother is the “natural” destiny of every woman, it guarantees the necessary workforce – constant fluidity of the people who are going to work, in other words, it uses the supposed vocation of caring for others

Knowing all this doesn't have to nullify many women's desire to be mothers. On the other hand, even knowing all this, and with the decision to do things differently, in some cases, so many others decide to be mothers. Conditioning more or less the social pressure of being a mother, because they have or do not want to have offspring and educate, because there are those who decide to be a mother, and the opposite. However, the decision to be a mother or not to be a mother brings everyone through the same crossing, so motherhood goes through everything. From this perspective, the members of the Emagin Association address a complex issue, understanding that motherhood has a concrete meaning for all women, either “opportunity, experience, decision, inability or renunciation”. For this reason they have named the days as they have called them: referring to motherhood using the plural and accommodating the elbow.

(No) maternity from the feminist point of view: undo, do, redo. Women meet under this name on 11 and 12 November in Tabakalera de Donostia. See Aranguren talks about the name of the days: “I think the image of motherhood is often static, and we wanted to expand that image a little to change it. So we've tried to offer space to different voices. I believe that in the lives of many there is a denial to be a mother, or a lack of desire, or whatever, which leads to concrete consequences, discomfort, tension, pressure, etc. We wanted to take them into account and take into account different maternity models.” Ainara Santamaría adds to his speech: “Everyone will decide whether they are a mother, not being or how they are. But whatever the decision, one is never left out of this problem, it will position itself in one place or another, but all issues are crossed. We wanted to legitimize this, and it also seems to us that it can greatly enrich the debate.”

Aranguren explains that raising the issue from this perspective is also a way to call every feminist to reflect on motherhood. They see the need to speak and reflect on “a collective experience of a purely political nature”. They have seen the need to talk about motherhood, to encourage feminist debate, to update the feminist discourse about motherhood and to put the issue on the feminist agenda. In addition, they have found indicators of these needs: on the one hand, in Emagine's activity they frequently approach the issue of care, and in these approaches the need to address the issue of motherhood becomes increasingly evident; on the other, projects, debates, groups, etc. have been known. The European Parliament has a duty to ensure that the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers have a say in this matter. Some women stated that in the Feminist Conference little space was offered to maternity. All these factors determined the organization of the days.

A slaughter as a starting point

There has been no slow challenge. They are aware that motherhood is a complex issue that has many edges, that is permeated by a series of issues that do not go beyond the personal level and that generates “pain, wounds, comprehension, judgment, rebellion, guilt, doubt, experience, imagery, closet…”. Aware of this, they consider it impossible to focus attention on any end of maternity in the days, but in the attempt to treat everything possible, an attempt has been made to identify the largest number of knots in the process before the preparation of the days. For this, they have resorted to close members “with different models of motherhood or who have given up being mothers” to know how they live (have) the subject. “After all, it’s about meeting people around a cafe to learn about their experience with maternity, to know what the main knots they’ve found,” explains Santamaría.

The informal collection of information seemed so interesting that they formed reflection and debate groups and made a face-to-face appointment. “At that meeting we were around two questions. On the one hand, what mandate does patriarchy and capitalism impose on us today in relation to motherhood? And on the other hand, looking at the days, what would we like them to be treated?” explains Santamaría. This process has confirmed the need to address the issue of motherhood: “People have been very grateful, involved from the outset in the discussion groups. The need to speak collectively on the subject is evident.”

“The process has not allowed us to talk about all existing knots, let alone liberate them,” Aranguren says. “We have a lot of work to identify which knots we want to release and to a large extent that is the goal of the days,” he adds. He explains that although the pending work is quite important, they have “intuitions” that indicate where it should go, because in the knots identification process some aspects have been added “constantly”. They can be clues to begin the release of the slaughter with collected knots.

After asking about the knots they have identified, Aranguren comments on what may be the biggest pile: “We have not yet updated the role of maternity as an institution in the current patriarchal system, nor what is the mandate regarding maternity in the twenty-first century and in the Basque Country. I think that's one of the things we have to land." According to the midwives, in these times when they talk about putting life and care at the center, it is essential to analyze motherhood as a social organization, since much of the reproductive work is closely linked to motherhood. They also define: “XXI. We must analyse (no) the issue of motherhood with the characteristics of the century. Because the presence of women in the labor market has changed, the priority in our lives of the production-public sector, the ways of building relationships, social networks… All this requires an update.”

Having said that, they begin to list the points of tension around the subject. “Motherhood, on the one hand, has this institutional character, but it is also desire. And we're seeing tension between desire and total dedication as a mother. Many talk about loneliness when we talk about tension,” Aranguren said. It has also stressed other tensions: “On the importance of the role of what becomes a mother” or “between feminist generations”, for example. “There are jumps between what the feminists of the 1970s claimed and what is claimed today, and we are no longer worthy of the discourse that was developed in the past.”

Santamaría insists that there is also tension in the balance of care tasks, indicating who cares for the caregiver, the weight of this question. In addition, he explains that if one thinks about motherhood, one focuses mainly on a concrete stage, linked to the initial years of the child, leaving aside other stages: “Despite knowing that motherhood is something for life, many women have pointed out that there is a great difference in maternity care at different stages of life, they have told us that from a moment they have found themselves without time to talk about motherhood and have felt very alone. They have cited as an example the adolescence or the moment when the daughter becomes the mother of her mother”.

Despite being organizers, they also have the knots they would like to work in the days. “We would like to focus on the relationship between motherhood and public space, and reflect on what we want to ask the public administration, which community,” says Aranguren. “When we often talk about care, we focus on the caregiver, but if we are going to talk about the responsibility of care, we must point out the responsibility that belongs to the collective, to the different institutions, to the governments,” adds Santamaría. Aranguren launches a starting point for reflection: “In recent years since feminism we have talked a lot about care and are turning to the idea of the public-community system. Well, how does motherhood cross there?”

A first approach

“There are those who argue that we have to give up the experience of motherhood; there are those who are challenged to think positively about motherhood; there are those who want to place the burden of growth in the states; or those who value all kinds of imaginaries and experiences of motherhood.” Emagine wants to bring all of them together because they want the days to be a place to share experiences and diverse points of view. It is not about articulating different discourses and practices around motherhood, but about offering a common umbrella to different perspectives to address and politicize the issue from a feminist perspective. They pose a realistic challenge: to make a first collective approach to the issue and encourage feminist reflection on maternity through this approach (no).

In addition to those mentioned, they have other objectives that they intend to address. As has already been said, today and today, you would like to see the role of maternity as an institution. They also want to pay attention to the identification of violence associated with motherhood, as well as to the establishment of strategies to combat them. “We want to identify what the bad ones are, what forms of violence women’s elections cross, how they relate to the social structure and what we should do to complete them.” They also want to devote space to the knowledge of the feminist theories, discourses and strategies that have been created in recent years about motherhood. And in addition to all this, they also want to look beyond the heteropatriarchal model of motherhood, sculpting alternatives; specifically, they talk about “practices to jump to community paternity” and its penetration.

The organizers hope to create a comfortable and fruitful space, where the respect, fraternity and conviction of the participants to change the current situation. They would like the debates to take place from the position of “woman and feminist” and not so much in relation to the needs of children. Santamaría has delved into this idea: “The starting point for our debate is how motherhood as a woman passes through us. The debate usually goes easily to the issue of education, but what we want is to give the debate as a woman and as a feminist, not so much in relation to the needs of children.” “These are certainly other threads that we have to pull. But at the moment we are at another point”, says Aranguren.

The conference was organized with the aim of making the exchange and debate between the participants simple and fruitful. To address the debate from the totality that covers not only the field of ideas, but also the body, conferences and round tables and other formats have been included in the program: exhibitions, musical performances, performances, cine-forum… So that what is to be spoken does not remain at a theoretical level and “so that one can listen and shape the discourse in other ways” have opted for a program that covers different formats.

In addition, Santamaría has explained that they have made an effort to also accommodate personal experiences, “so that it is not only a space to speak collectively or a challenge for the movement and to talk about the changes to be made”. In this sense, he explains that they have a dual objective: “Leave a mark on the work of the days on a personal level and define new challenges for the movement”.