TONIGHT

• Home
• Video
• Podcasts/RSS 
• Local Showtimes
• Past Shows
• Blogs
• About the Show
• Tell Tavis
• Features
• Mobile

RELATED LINKS

• V-Day
• USA Today article on Ms. Ensler
• About Insecure at Last
• The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan

E-mail a friend

Tavis: Eve Ensler is the critically acclaimed author and playwright behind the wildly successful play the 'Vagina Monologues.' How successful? Well, it's been translated now in 45 languages, and performed all over the world. 'The New York Times' called it probably the most important piece of political theater in the last decade. Her latest book is called 'Insecure at Last: Losing It in Our Security-Obsessed World.' Eve Ensler, nice to have you on the program.

Eve Ensler: Thrilled to be here.

Tavis: Did the 'New York Times' get it right? Is it political theater?

Ensler: Well, I think so, yeah. They began that article saying that political theater has no impact, which is kind of like the 'New York Times.' But no, I think it's political. I heard (sounds like) Audrey and Rich once say that the minute a feeling enters the body, it's political. And I think we misunderstand what political means in this country. Political means that you're present, you're here, you're involved in what's happening. So yeah, I think it's political.

Tavis: For those who have not seen it, and it's been everywhere, as I mentioned a moment ago, what's the message that you want to convey through the play?

Ensler: Well, the play was really about women talking about their vaginas, loving their vaginas, owning their vaginas, and being in their bodies. I think what I discovered interviewing women is that most women were so disconnected from their bodies and disconnected from their essential selves that they weren't empowered. They weren't in themselves, in their beings.

And I think what the play has done is allowed women to tell their stories, and be true, and be really where they are. And by doing that, they've come into themselves and taken back their voices, and taken back the power. Which is what - it's kind of a fantastic outcome.

Tavis: I think anybody could argue, once they've read the text here, the new book, 'Insecure At Last,' that the message of the book and the message of the play are not really that disparate, although you can only argue that once you've read the text. At first glance, though, they do seem to be two different pieces of work. 'Insecure At Last.' That said, when I first saw the book, Eve, the first thought I had, because I'm such a student of Dr. King, was his line, free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, we are free at last. So he says free at last, you've got insecure at last. Why the title?

Ensler: Well, absolutely it was Dr. King, great inspiration of my life. And I think we're living in a country that since 9/11, the basic obsession and thrust has been security. Security clearance, security watch, security checks, security, security. We say it as much as we say hamburger here. And I started thinking why, in the name of all this, have I never felt more insecure in my life?

And I started to really think about what the government is talking about when it talks about security. What are they talking about? And that began this huge examination, beginning with my own life, where I was brought up in a home where it had all the trappings, and everybody was telling me how secure I was. It was a little upper middle class neighborhood, I had a white picket fence, and my father was essentially beating me and molesting me all the time.

So there was this huge split. And that kind of compelled me into the world, distrusting what people were calling security, and it led me around the world, looking for logic and security. And in the process of that, it got very deconstructed, beginning in Bosnia where I went thinking I was gonna go and help people. And sat with women who had been through atrocities and had been through hell, and that dissolved my boundaries, it dissolved my moorings.

And over the last 10 years particularly, I think what's happened to me is I've become profoundly insecure, and I've never felt better. And what I mean by that is that I understand I'm connected to it all. That I'm not gonna be spared from death, I'm not gonna be spared from aging, I'm probably not gonna be spared from sickness. I'm not gonna be spared from people losing me.

And I think what's happened in America is that the government has convinced people that somehow, this uber-security, this huge uber-security that we're spending billions of dollars a year is gonna protect everybody from all these existential realities that are impossible to be protected from. And in the name of that uber security, we've completely just sacrificed human security.

So that people aren't being fed, people aren't having jobs, people aren't having healthcare, and yet we're building more and more and more and more bombs, and more and more military equipment. And in the name of that, we've just really let go of all compassion and heart and kindness and connection and human values.

Tavis: I think I know the answer, but I don't want to presuppose here, or presume. But you have traveled to parts all over the globe following any number of disasters. You've mentioned a couple already, we could add to that list. Hurricane Katrina, I could go on and on and on with places you have gone after the fact, to see what, in fact, happened, what people had to say. And you can share more about that in just a second.

I'm only raising that, Eve, 'cause I'm curious as to how you come to I think a pretty reasonable conclusion, after having experienced these strange, bizarre, horrific, troubling events. You follow me?

Ensler: Totally, yeah.

Tavis: You come with a very reasonable conclusion, but you start at a strange place, or places, as it were.

Ensler: Well, let me give you a...

Tavis: That make sense?

Ensler: Totally. I totally get what you mean, because it's kind of like how, if you've been going into all these horrible, insecure things are you coming out saying insecurity's okay?

Tavis: You should be a talk show host. (Laugh) You did that better than I did. You wanna change seats here? Interview yourself? Go ahead, I'm sorry.

Ensler: (Laugh) I wanted to just tell this great story about women I know in New Orleans who I've become really good friends with, 'cause I was down there interviewing them after the storm. And two great women, I was sitting on porches for days, just listening to people's stories. And this woman named Sophie was telling her story, horrible stories. Superdome, just in the midst of the most terrible catastrophes.

And her friend says to her Sophie, Sophie, tell her about the magic markers, tell her about the magic markers. So Sophie says well, during the storm, when it was at the worst, the mayor came on and told all of us to get permanent magic markers and to write our Social Security numbers on our inner arm. And she looked at me and she said, I wasn't gonna do that.

I wasn't gonna agree to die. And then she said, and furthermore, where would poor people get permanent magic markers? Now to me, this sums up everything. You've got a country where people are completely alone, completely abandoned, completely left; no one's sent anybody before the storm to help them, because all those troops are busy defending our uber-security, and creating a war which is escalating terrorism in Iraq.

Okay? Nobody's there. Then the government comes out and says, go and get an object you can't afford to write your number, so when you're dead, because we haven't rescued you, so we can identify your dead body. To me, that sums up the story of America right now. Every time I think about it, I go the madness of that moment, the madness of that moment.

And if our focus were on really caring about - if the focus of this country were not on security, but it were on compassion, or it were on connection, or it were on freedom, we would have found a way to save the people in Katrina. We would have found a way to get that woman out of that situation before we were telling her to write her own death certificate.

Tavis: Is it, that is to say security versus compassion, security versus love, security versus concern, an either-or proposition, or is it a both-and proposition?

Ensler: I think it's that if we focused on compassion and peace, we would be more secure. I think if we put our attitudes towards, like, the perfect example of that is I went to Afghanistan in 1999. I was there under the Taliban. I actually had that videotape in my hand that later got shown of the woman being executed in the stadium in Kabul. When I came back, I wrote an article and I had that videotape.

I went to every news outlet. Just about every news outlet. No one would touch it. You know what they said? What does Afghan women have to do with America and our security? Well, we know now, it had everything to do with our security. There's not a person on this planet who isn't connected to each one of our security, and I think when you understand the interconnectedness, and when you are in compassion and in relationship with everybody, and when you start thinking how, if we fed people and educated people and provided resources for people across the globe, that would totally change world security. But instead, we're escalating bombs, and we're escalating invasions, and we're escalating occupations.

Tavis: All right, so as I've said many times on this program and on my radio program, as my grandmother, Big Mama, would say, it's too much like right. What you've just said just makes too much sense.

Ensler: Right, exactly. (Laugh)

Tavis: The question is whether or not you think that anybody in this race for the White House, since we are already in it, could sell that. If you can't sell it, the American people can't buy it. My sense is not that the American people can't buy it, but that nobody's courageous enough to try to sell it. So how does it get out there?

Ensler: I agree with you completely. Having toured America a lot in the last few years, Americans are good people, and they're smart people. They get this. They get this everywhere I go. We need leaders who are gonna stand up and say we don't want a military democracy, we want a humane democracy. We don't want a country that is bullying the world and dominating the world and occupying.

We want one that's feeding and educating and loving the world. That's how you win terrorism. That's how you dry up the fertile ground of terrorism. And I think if there were a leader who were willing to come forward now and stand tall in that message, not maybe in that message, but tall in that message, the entire direction of this country would shift overnight.

Tavis: I was reading a piece the other day, and based upon a piece I was reading, I'm working on a piece myself now. And the whole notion is this question of whatever happened to the notion of love in public discourse? Now before you turn the channel, the people who pooh-pooh that notion, that's what King talked about, it's what Gandhi talked about, it's what Mandela talked about.

And it seems to me we can't dismiss these men from their methodologies. But there's a fundamental question to be asked there of whatever happened to the notion of love in public discourse? What's your take on that?

Ensler: I think it's the crucial piece. If I've learned anything from traveling the globe and sitting with women who have suffered, who've been through rape, who've been through violations, who've been through acid burnings, who've been through genital mutilation, these women in most communities have grieved that suffering, they transformed that suffering, and now they devote their lives to taking care of other people.

That's love. That's another paradigm operating. That's about you attack me, and I don't get the next big weapon. I actually feel what that feels like. So I would never do that to another person, and I'm compelled to find another direction that requires imagination, that requires strategy, that requires big thinking, and that requires heart. And we are so now geared to a world which is all about the opposite of that. That if we're really gonna turn it, it's gotta come on that hinge of love.

Tavis: That said, do you remain hopeful?

Ensler: Oh, yeah.

Tavis: Why?

Ensler: Because there's women in every country, and men that we call Vagina Warriors in V World who are working every single day on a grassroots level, whether it's Agnes in Africa, who built a safe house to stop FGM, or Sophie and Pat, who are building their church in New Orleans, or Cindy Sheehan, who's out stopping the war. There are so many people on a grassroot level who are working every hour to transform suffering.

And I get the privilege of sitting with those people and being inspired by those people. And who am I to complain if Zoya can get up every day in Afghanistan and do revolutionary work, and risk her life. Or Esther in Juarez gets up every day and saves women from being disappeared in the maquiladora. Who am I to complain? There's work to be done.

Tavis: Speaking of revolutionary work, there is work to be done, and Eve Ensler is on the case. 'Insecure At Last, Losing It in Our Security-Obsessed World.' Certain to be another best seller from Eve. Nice to have you on the program.

Ensler: Thank you.

Tavis: Glad to have you here.

Ensler: Thanks.

Tavis: That's our show for tonight. You can catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local listings. See you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from Los Angeles, thanks for watching, and as always, keep the faith.