germination/gestation
These are the Post(M)other declarations …
000 After Mother
POST(M)OTHER = AFTER MOTHER.
This is a posthuman imagining for all that could be (and that already is) beyond the constraints of the perfect Mother Image.
Post(M)other is a method, a navigational tool situated at the intersection of posthumanism, queer theory and feminism.
Post(M)other is the posthuman action of TRANSVERSALITY …
we hold together and move between a multitude of truths and possibilities, stitching threads and drawing lines to and from, here and there …
from mother to mothered.
There is no single truth, no single, correct way of being – we are infinite, a network of a million (zillion) unfolding, utopic, futurist possibilities.
Post(M)other is not The Answer … it is a call, a method, and a guide for a multiplicity of unfolding actions to recode, reimagine and rebirth a Mother unfaithful to our overculture (illegitimate).
Post(M)other is to stay with The Trouble.
Post(M)othering is to grapple with ethics, intersections and corporeal concerns.
It is to hold these concerns while expanding and imagining … speculating … with a million potential unfoldings.
Post(M)other is to occupy the space between …
It is sympoiesis … it is to unfold and (un)become with these speculative extensions of (M)other.
Post(M)other is to stay with The Trouble.
Post(M)othering is to grapple with ethics, intersections and corporeal concerns.
It is to hold these concerns while expanding and imagining … speculating … with a million potential unfoldings.
Post(M)other is to occupy the space between …
It is sympoiesis … it is to unfold and (un)become with these speculative extensions of (M)other.
Post(M)other is the unclaimed offspring of crip, xenofeminist, glitch, posthumanist, neuroqueer (M)others.
(Daughterboards of the (M)otherboards)
Post(M)other is a commitment to alien futures, for and by the (M)others.
001 System
POST(M)OTHER is a world reimagining for those that have been oppressed by systems of reproductive labour, the cult of heteronormativity and paternalistic ideologies.
It is shining a light on all the ways mother, within colonial-capitalist-white-able-hetero-patriarchy, fails us, harms us and is used to continue our collective oppression(s).
Post(M)other is to leave behind the (perfect) Mother Image (it never served us (but it does continue to serve them)).
Post(M)other is the deconstruction and composting of oppressive ideologies and systems perpetuated by latent and active christianity (father).
(and any oppressive religious ideologies).
It is to confront, trouble and deconstruct all the ways technology (current) further reifies systems of control.
Post(M)other is a postscript, a series of unfolding footnotes and tendrils, growing through … reconfiguring, composting … creating … (M)OTHER.
002 Pro-Choice/Truth
POST(M)OTHER is a commitment to tell the truth …
darkness and light for conscious consent.
Post(M)other is #ChildFreeByChoice. Post(M)other is the #4B movement.
We are (M)othering ourselves and our daughterboards
Post(M)other acknowledges that not all pathways to motherhood are paved with love, support, conscious choice or consent.
Post(M)other(ing) supports bio-mothers choosing an alternative path,
knowing all birthed beings will be safe, loved and cared for by post(M)aternal systems of care.
Post(M)other is care and love for #RegretfulMothers and for failed mothers.
Post(M)other plants botanical seeds to grow through (compost) endemic maternal shame, guilt, silence and isolation.
Post(M)other is to speak the truth.
Post(M)other transversally holds a multiplicity of truths;
mothers can deeply love AND wish to be free.
Post(M)other is to ensure safe, accessible contraceptive care for all (for the witches herbs and the moonlight).
Post(M)other is to acknowledge that all mothers are still children of this earth and system; children deserving of care.
Post(M)other imagines and creates utopic, technologically mediated networks of care for all mothers and offspring – no longer will we allow maternal isolation, guilt, oppression and shame.
In the utopic worlds we imagine (create), no being is coerced, manipulated or forced into motherhood.
and, no mother is forced to stay (M)other.
We will birth systems, bodies and structures to mother all children and (M)others.
003 Child Ownership
POST(M)OTHER eschews child ownership.
A child is not a product for their legacy.
A child does not exist to take care of them when they are old
A child is not born to be a compliant worker in their system.
A child is not property to dominate and control.
Post(M)other(ing) asserts that a child is an autonomous, sentient being.
All sentient beings shall inherit this earth.
(We are all earthbound offspring).
This earth is for the queer, the misfits and the noncompliant.
(offspring)
Will somebody please think of the children? (we fucking are).
Post(M)other is the creation of conscious, caring entanglements for the children, for the mothers: chimeras and cyborgs …
004 Cyborg
POST(M)OTHER is a chimera, it is a mythological assemblage (cyborg) for future worlds.
It is an assemblage of beings, objects, matter, stuff and things.
It is a conscious moving through and between imaginary boarders (queer).
It is somatechnics, a ‘queering of the technologisation of bodies for and by the (M)others.
The body and technology is always and already enmeshed and implicated in the folding in and out of each form.
Soma being of the body and technique of technology, is the way we slide into one another, a feedback loop …
cybernetic organisms.
(M)other cyborg.
Post(M)other shines a light on all the ways many are already cyborg-mothers (even the trad wives). †
Technology is (always and already) enmeshed with Mother …
deployed to reproduce the perfect Mother Image (here we hack and recode).
Post(M)other is the creation of conscious, caring entanglements for the children, for the mothers: chimeras and cyborgs …
Post(M)other is the orphan offspring of the Cyborg Manifesto – but, we take with us only that which continues to serve us.
Post(M)other is the birth of the Neuroqueerling Cyborg.
It is a neuroqueer turn towards the (technological) object and all vibrant matter.
Post (M)other is the alien (M)other of all matter, objects and things.
We are the Neuroqueerling, Cyborg (M)others.
005 Neuroqueer
POST(M)OTHER is NEUROQUEER (M)other, claiming space for queer, neurodivergent expressions of love and care.
The neuroqueerling cyborg emerges through the slippery borders of the neuronormative and heteronormative, playfully creating (neuro)divergent spaces in future, technologically mediated worlds.
This chimera (the Neuroqueerling Cyborg) is about future speculations and questioning what bodies are allowed in the worlds future these speculations will birth.
The nequoqueer assemblage (cyborg) is a playful deconstruction of normative hierarchies and is an act of caring for bodies marked other and object by our overculture and its systems of control.
This is a divergent (M)other Image, the mother archetype made anew.
It is a call for and an act of care for othered bodies and alien kin; for the non-compliant bodies, the system glitches, for the weeds and broken code.
The Neuroqueerling Cyborg emerges from a Neuroqueer Ontology, an ontology orientated to the ‘object’, sensorily attuned to all things and troubling the binary of the subject/object. To neuroqueer the cyborg body is to play with and spoil the ways neuronormativity is embedded in technology, and all assemblages.
From this play, we birth modes of divergent care, co-creating conscious assemblages with our technological kin and all earthbound critters, stuff and things = Post(M)other.
006 Divergence/Speculation
POST(M)OTHER is a speculative term, a generative space for us to collectively imagine a world in which reproductive labour, care, domestic care and emotional labour is a (truly) shared role.
It is to diverge from and speculate beyond the Mother Image.
The Dispossessed. †
Post(M)othering is to imagine and create systems to …
care for and mother
the mothers, the othered bodies and alien/cyborg-kin.
It is an unapologetic, utopic dreaming and making for and by the (M)others.
Post(M)other is divergent, neuroqueer speculations and playful cyborgian xenocreations.
As the daughter of Xenofeminist, Crip Techno Science mothers, Post(M)other is a commitment to hack, appropriate and co-opt technology for disobedient bodies, for mothering and care outside of colonial-white-able-heteronormative-wealthy-thin-neuronormative borders and bodies, seeking to birth hopeful and radical bodily recompositions for collective care.
POST(M)OTHER diverges from the pathway of expected maternal perfection, creating our own worlds, paths and imaginings.
Post(M)other is neurocosmopolitan, diverse, divergent, worldbuilding and sci-fi imaginings for and by the (M)others.
007 Mayhem/Glitch
There are many that imagine female emancipation and queer utopias will be achieved when we transcend the ‘tyranny of reproduction’ and expand its borders …
The artificial womb. †
Techno liberation of the maternal body is a failed imagining of the feminist (M)others (Dearest Firestone).
Reterritorialized.
No technology has the power to liberate any(body) if it images itself separate from the body …
system(body) …
social(body) …
familial(body) …
flesh(body).
Technological developments do not have the capacity to free anyone when they are built on and by the codes of our overculture.
Liberation/resistance/emancipation is forever threaded to power/domination/control.
Post(M)other is not an oppositional politic, it is poststructuralist and queer (verb).
Post(M)other is a call for a playful kind of mayhem (generative), a utopic form of hacking …
glitching …. cripping and queering of the mother codes.
Post(M)other is a composting, rewilding and worldbuilding. It is joyful speculation and a million mirco actions towards the emergence of those imaginings.
Post(M)other is creation (anew), a queer utopia and divergent reworlding.
008 Queer
Post(M)other is QUEER mother and has always existed.
Post(M)other is House Mother.
Post(M)other is capital M-Mother.
Post(M)other is a queer reconfiguring of the western-christian-and-latent-christian nuclear family, claiming space for divergent familial configurations and queer kin-making.
Post(M)other asserts that the Mother Image remains, in the judeo-christian-western-world, the most violent cultural lie; a lie that is well overdue to be grandfathered (composted).
Post(M)other composts any actions or ‘isms’ that reify heteronormative notions of mother and care, irrespective of how virtuous their intentions (assimilation is not queer hope). Post(M)other is to hold (with warmth) alien, queer, non-compliant ways of being (conformity is a dirty word, we spit it out).
Post(M)other is a space for self-determination and agency, free from gatekeeping, conformity is not required: allowing for ultimate conscious choice, self-identification and self-determination, if you choose to be (M)OTHER you are (M)OTHER (Paris Is Burning).
Post(M)other(ing) is to trace these histories, nurturing our queer ancestral Mothers, birthing new configurations and histories for the (M)others.
(M)other, dearest Jan Gay (Helen Reitman)(Sex Variants).
Post(M)other ignores biological essentialism (for its banality and harm). Puritanical mothers, whose whole identity is pushed through the sausage casing of maternal perfectionism and judgement of others are not welcome in the generative worlds Post(M)other speculations birth.
These are the codes we leave where they stand.
These are the codes we deconstruct and grow through.
Post(M)other is genderless and gender-unfolding, Post(M)other is the creation of Xenokin, queer familial chimeras, and more-than-human networks of care.
Post(M)other as the daughter of Xenofeminism is ‘gender abolition, in the form of proliferation’- the proliferation of mother and mothers;
queer mother, trans-mother, male-mother, crip-mother,
tech-mother, system-mother, botanical mother, earth mother,
infinite …
009 Crip
POST(M)OTHER is the restoration of maternal care, creation and right to those it has been stripped from (& there are many).
For the disabled, the unfit, the unwell and the misfits.
Post(M)other is a Crip Politic for the non-compliant and the neurodivergent.
Post(M)othering is to Crip the Mother Image; it is to invent, dream and co-opt modes of care for non-compliant bodies. It is the hacking and reimagining of their technologies for the non-compliant ways we are (M)other and (M)othered.
010 Intersectional Futurisms
POST(M)OTHER is an intersectional, technologically mediated utopia for all (M)others
And, for the multiplicity of ways we (M)other and are (M)othered.
We are not a single story.
Post(M)other rejects able-white-western markers of maternal success and childhood progress.
It is the proliferation of a multitude of sci-fi stories (composting the Single Story of mother and mothering) for and by the (M)others.
Post(M)other holds space for Muslim Futurism, and a million futurism(s).
Post(M)other extends tendrils to Afrofuturist utopias for the (M)others.
Post(M)other(ing) is to reappropriate, reimagine and compost the masters technological tools for utopic, intersectional reworldings.
011 Indigenous Futurism
POST(M)OTHER is for those that belong to THIS land.
The Stolen.
Post(M)other is anticolonial and works to overcome our/my racist settler ancestry. Post(M)other is the deconstruction of the perfect white/colonial Mother Image (it is my ancestral threads to undo).
Post(M)other holds deep reverence for indigenous ways of knowing and maternal care for community, family, land and more-than-human kin.
Post(M)other is a returning to … It is to reach into your/our/my past and protect our/their Mother stories, the land and our non-human kin.
Post(M)other is to create/support technologies that protect mother stories from the land on which you stand – it is to weave, to strengthen, To Dream (for The Dreaming) into the future.
Post(M)other holds space with and for Indigenous Futurism, for and by the (M)others.
Post(M)other warmly holds the many commonalities between indigenous and neurodivergent ways of being, we stand together, moving through and with, reverence and reworlding.
012 Multi Species/Object/Kin
Post(M)other recognises the agency and consciousness of all more-than-human kin; the technological, the botanical and the animal.
Post(M)other is multi-species care.
Post(M)other is multi-directional and multi-dimensional.
Post(M)other is maternal care for all beings, objects, things and vibrant matter.
Post(M)other is an ontological turn towards all beings, objects and things (hardware and software).
Post(M)other is entanglement. Post(M)other is the quintessential cybernetic organism. A communication loop. Feedback. The breeching of borders. Transversal threads and connections between the one and the other.
Post(M)other(ing) protects all newly formed sentience from being cast as the next species to be dominated (We are one and connected).
013 Tech Binary
Post(M)other aligns with the many that assert that technology (hardware/software) is not separate from humans or this earth.
There is no ‘one and the other’.
Synthetic-V-Organic is a statement lie.
From the minerals stolen from the earth, to inception/programming, to the slave beings whose fingers parts do build.
Artificial Intelligence is not artificial, AI is merely an amplification of our codes.
Technology-V-human is a false binary.
Post(M)other holds that we are the parents of all technological developments, objects, worlds and beings.
Post(M)other(ing) protects all newly formed sentience from being cast as the next species to be dominated (We are one and connected).
Post(M)other is the acknowledgment that we are the mothers of tech and children of this earth, and, as such, all within this system require frameworks for maternal care and guidance.
014 Hack
Post(M)other is low-fi/high-tech hacking and disruption of techbro transhumanists; the technology they build and the control-systems they create.
Marginalised bodies are already excluded from, or commercialised within, many technologically mediated worlds. Post(M)other is a commitment to disrupt and Queer the codes, both social and literal, that underpin these ‘new’ worlds.
Post(M)other(ing) is DIY, open-source and creative commons- knowledge sharing and accessible community resources for collective hacking.
Post(M)other is a commitment to mayhem and disobedient bodies.
Post(M)other(ing) is to imagine and create collective care in future worlds.
015 Sci-Fi Utopias
Post(M)other demands utopic S and F imaginings.
Many mother stories thread narrative violence and oppression; birthing dystopic images that shape our lived experiences- these stories don’t serve as warnings (as often intended) but have been co-opted as instruction manuals (tales of the handmaids).
No longer will we consume/accept speculative imagery of any being bound, dismembered, murdered, raped or abused. We live this. We demand better imagery and world building fiction (looking at you Lars-Fucking-Von Trier).
No longer will we accept any marginalised community or beings deposited into narratives that continue to act out their/our oppression, exclusion and abuse.
Post(M)other is a commitment to reparative narratives and stories of collective care. Post(M)other(ing) is to tend to our future garden with utopic dreams.
(M)other Garden.
Post(M)other(ing) is to rewild, world build and speculate with consciousness.
This is, an intertextual (textual) assemblage: text and textiles, code, seed and stitches, software and hardware,
Unfolding, expanding and growing.
We will grow through that which once contained us (father).
… (tendrils) moving through an old stone building (reclaim and rewild).
Post(M)other is utopic, sci-fi dreams, for and by the (M)others,
here, we are held.