This week I talked with award-winning writer Sarah Schulman about her new book “The Fantasy & Necessity of Solidarity” published by Penguin Random House. Schulman is a longtime social activist from the fight for abortion rights in post-Franco Spain to NYC’s AIDS activism in the 1990s to campus protest movements against Israel’s war on Gaza & beyond bringing her own experience growing up as a queer female artist in male-dominated culture industries. In these challenging times with our democracy at a moral crossroad this must-read book couldn’t be more timely. For those who seek to combat injustice, solidarity with the oppressed is one of the highest ideals yet it does not come without complication. In this searing yet uplifting book Sarah delves into the intricate & often misunderstood concept of solidarity to provide a new vision for what it means to engage in this work & why it matters. Here in America with the new administration we’re beginning to understand & realize that the only people that will save us from this authoritarian regime are ourselves. Drawing parallels between queer, Jewish, feminist & artistic struggles for justice Schulman challenges the traditional notion of solidarity as a simple union of equals arguing that in today’s world of globalized power structures true solidarity requires the collaboration of bystanders & conflicted perpetrators with the excluded & oppressed. Currently in America we are learning that action comes at a cost & it is not always as effective as we would like it to be but doing nothing is far more dangerous. I talked to Sarah about these current issues & her inspiration for writing “The Fantasy & Necessity of Solidarity”.
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