Motherhugger

The Year Starts Now

2012-01-27T04:37:00.000-08:00

Holidays are over. We’ve caught up with friends, slept in, and spent lots of time just lounging at home. I haven’t done any drawing or making music, but I still have two days. Haven’t I?

I’ve learned that I’m better on nine hours sleep than seven. When I think about how much I am trying to cram into this year, I feel like going back to bed.

I’m doing three units for the next two semesters (including teaching pracs), starting part time work and have some volunteering commitments (teaching ethics and organising Mamapaloosa). The kids’ activities have stepped up a notch. I told them years ago that they could do anything offered at school, not realising just how much is offered at our school, and now they’re doing, well, lots. I’ll be giving up watching tv and reading blogs by people I don’t know. I’ll be taking up walking and swimming and stretching at home.

Matilda is telling me I should be baking muffins for the freezer and meals for when we come home late. She’s telling me we need to cull about half our possessions. Before school starts on Monday. She wants us to register for an eco challenge. We’re already pretty green, but, of course, could do better.

Really, I’m just hoping we plod along according to schedule. I’m not expecting anything spectacular. I’m just hoping to avoid the bumps in the road. The fevers and falls and trips to hospital and life changing emergencies and unforeseen events that are part of life and being part of a family with people young and old. I just want to postpone them for this year. And next. Laugh at me now. What I want is possible. Not likely. But possible. Isn’t it?

A feminist event!

2012-01-25T01:54:00.000-08:00

Thanks to my friend Michelle for telling me about this.

http://www.sydneyoperahouse.com/priority/the_f_word.aspx

Separate sessions with Germaine Greer, and Naomi Wolf, then they join a forum discussion led by Jenny Brockie, with Clem Bastow and Eliza Griswold.

Seems like a much more grown up event than the last, stupid one I attended at the Opera House. I'm looking forward to a bigger, broader, more global conversation.

I'd like to go!

Mum thinks it is ok to break the law, because she's a mum

2012-01-24T14:54:00.000-08:00

Jacinta Tynan, who wrote a piece when her first baby was six months old, saying how motherhood was easy and why do people complain about how hard it is, has now written a piece saying she considers herself exempt from the road rules because she has two children. Reading this, I thought she was being ironic, or sarcastic, but no. She genuinely believes she has the right to break the law, because she has kids.

'To the parking inspector who tried to slap a ticket on me the other day: an apology. I was in a clearly marked No Stopping zone and you didn't deserve my teary tirade. You had every right to threaten to call the police and to call for backup from not one but two supervisors. It's just that I had two children in the back of the car and I thought that bought me dispensation.

Ever since I became a mother, I have learnt to cut corners, ignoring not just traffic signs but all manner of procedures designed to make life easier because in my state they no longer do, and I brazenly now consider myself exempt. Surely No Stopping means unless you have babies on board and are attempting to drop off stuff at St Vincent de Paul, as I was. Surely parking limits don't apply when ferrying children to the park. Why can't I jump to the front of the Jetstar check-in when I have a baby in my Björn? Don't mums deserve to bypass the queue at Woolies?'

...At least that nice parking inspector understood. Much to my surprise, I was issued with a warning for that blatant misdemeanour. I won't park there again, I promise. But what a treat to have my circumstances taken into account.

I'm thinking she would be a parent who feels she has the right to break the road rules when dropping off or picking up her kids at daycare or school,even though they would endanger other people.

For the last six years I've been tearing my hair out most mornings and afternoons seeing parents break the road rules around the school. People who park on the crossing, or do a u turn on the crossing, or park in the No Stopping zones by the crossings. Drivers pulling into the school driveways while children are walking into or out of the school gates. The most dangerous part of our walk to and from school is using the school crossings. For six years I've sat on the P&C and we've regularly talked about ways to convince parents it is a good idea to follow the road rules around the school. We've talked about walking to school. Leaving five minutes earlier. Road safety. Explaining the reasons for the road rules. Setting a good example. Being seen by the members of the community as someone who obeys the law. We've called in the police and the parking police. When they are present on one side of the school, people just break the law on the other side of the school. We've collected the rego numbers of the cars whose drivers break the law, and phoned them through to the police. I keep suggesting that we ask for tax audits for all the parents who continually break the law around the school, but the Principal says no.

The comments on the piece are mostly about the parking spots for parents in shopping centres, and the usual parents feel entitled/what about childfree adults who pick up the pieces to and fro.

I feel like I felt when Fifi Box announced on The Panel that she doesn't vote - she sends her mother to vote for her. Shame on her, when so many women have fought for women's rights. Jacinta Tynan: you are giving mothers a bad name. Breaking the law is breaking the law. You have not the right to break any law that may seem inconvenient to you. I hope when your children are at school that you don't endanger other children because you feel your time is more precious than other people's lives. You should have been issued with a parking ticket.

http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/life-style/family-home/mumsonly-privileges-20120124-1qeo2.html

Rachel Hills on the reaction to her piece on MTR.

2012-01-23T15:36:00.000-08:00

A response from Rachel Hills on the controversy her piece on Melinda Tankard Reist has sparked over the last two weeks. All the links are here in her piece. I've found I'm not so out of step afterall with the feminists I'd been reading online last week. Phew. Glad that it has opened up a public discussion on what feminism is, and that I've learned, well, lots - mostly to make no presumptions about people's definitions of feminism.

I was wondering what her response would be.

http://rachelhills.tumblr.com/post/16364379780/notes-on-a-scandal-melinda-tankard-reist-and-me

And, by the way, this, by Cathy Sherry, is what my friends and I agree with.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/sisterhood-beware--silencing-ideas-stymies-progress-20120124-1qfnx.html

SMH are running a poll with the article. So far, most voters agree that women who oppose abortion have the right to call themselves feminist.

PS. The polling of 2307 people results 55% to 45% in favour of women who oppose abortion having the right to call themselvs feminists.

Feminism and sex work: should women be for sale?

2012-01-23T15:33:00.000-08:00

There is an advertising campaign in Ireland at the moment to raise awareness about the rights of sex workers. The campaign seeks to present sex workers as ordinary healthy people, who have children and pay their mortgage, and who don’t deserve the stigma and discrimination sex workers face. The campaign is in response to the movement to ban sex work in Ireland, called Turn off the Red Light.

The movement to ban sex work has been growing in Europe.

France is joining other European countries such as Sweden, Norway and Iceland, in making the buying of sex illegal. This means the client will be charged, fined and/or imprisoned. Iceland has also banned sex clubs and profits from nudity, so, no lapdancing and no topless waitressing. Sex trafficking has declined. The prime minister of Iceland is a lesbian woman who was a single mother for eleven years until she married her partner. Same sex marriage is legal. Almost half the parliamentarians in Iceland are female. The passing of these laws in Iceland is seen as a feminist victory. Iceland is considered the best place in the world to be a woman. For two years it has topped the World Economic Forum’s report on gender equality. Its policy on domestic violence states that the person who committed the violence must leave the home. They have strong supports for families, with maternal and paternal leave, and affordable child care. From 2013 corporations will be obliged to have at least 40% of each gender on their boards. Sweden and Norway are also well known for their socially progressive policies that support gender equality.

The message is clear. Women are not for sale. Women are worthy of respect. It’s an attractive idea. It’s a message one would hope would infiltrate all through society so that women are portrayed in a respectful manner, from boardrooms to billboards, from t shirts to video games. The message, from high office, that women should be respected, with supporting policies in all fields (health, work, education, justice) is a feminist dream come true.

However, some object to the move to ban sex work, saying it will simply make prostitution more dangerous for sex workers. This is an issue in Australia too.

Scarlett Alliance, the Australian Sex Workers’ Alliance, says that the legislation currently proposed by the NSW government to move from a decriminalisation model to a licensing model of regulation will drive many currently law abiding sex workers into the illegal sector. The licensing model as it has been implemented in Victoria and Queensland has not resulted in the expected outcomes. It results in very low compliance and means that sex workers are further marginalised and vulnerable. The current model of decriminalisation is lobbied for by sex workers throughout the world as the only model of sex industry regulation that supports sex workers’ rights, and encourages good health and safety practices.

Feminism is not only about protecting women who may be vulnerable, but about listening to the voices of women about their own experience and own needs. Sex workers have rights just as any workers do. (And it isn’t only women who work in the sex industry.)

But does legalising prostitution legitimise the trading of women for sex? It is possible for legal brothels to engage in the criminal activity of keeping sex slaves and accepting trafficked women. How best to reduce the illegal activity? Should campaigns focus on reducing demand for sexual services and protecting those who choose to work in the sex industry? Is it OK for educated women who have real options to choose to do sex work, but not OK for uneducated women or drug addicted women, or those who have no options, and those we could be helping? Would women choose sex work if they had well paying options with real work flexibility?

It is difficult to think about sex workers in the west without thinking about sex work in developing countries, and how many girls and women are traded/forced/raped/abused sexually. Often, for them, being in the sex industry isn’t a choice.

Many people around the world are working in advocacy and agency, investing in women and girls in developing countries to assist their families’ and communities’ move out of poverty and into dignity. Women working as health workers in rural communities; who insist on being part of peace talks; working to help the 1100 women a day who are raped in the Democratic Republic of Congo; who work with infant and maternal health in developing countries; who help women and girls escape the sex trade, are taking feminist action. They are working for the basic rights of women. Does that include the right to earn a living in the sex industry?

In fifty years which idea will be so obvious to us that we cannot believe we contemplated anything else; the idea that women are not for sale, or the idea that sex workers have rights? Or is it possible for us as a society to agree with the clear message that is a little more complex; that all women deserve respect, even women who choose to do sex work?

Was Margaret Thatcher a Feminist?

2012-01-11T15:46:00.000-08:00

This is nice. I ask a question and the internet answers. Well, Rachel Hills, on the other side of the world, answers.

A feminist, in my view, is a person interested in the politics of being female (my personal interest is in the politics of gender, but I’m willing to let people with an interest in women only slide here); someone who believes in gender equality and pursues policies and philosophies with that end in mind.

Her war-starting, union-busting proclivities aside, Thatcher wasn’t a feminist for the simple reason that she had no interest in the politics of gender, little interest in pursuing policies with equality (of outcome or opportunity) in mind, and as far as I’ve read, little interest in the structural factors that contribute to inequality of opportunity or outcome. Not to mention that she notoriously said that she “owed nothing to women’s lib”.

But can other conservative or religious women call themselves feminists? Sure – if they believe that the policies they’re pursuing are the path to gender equality. And note well: that doesn’t mean you have to like them, or agree with them on everything (or anything, for that matter).

There are plenty of issues I disagree with other feminists on. I disagree with Germaine Greer on trans people. I disagree with Naomi Wolf’s handling of the Julian Assange sexual assault case. I disagree with the woman I met at the Feminism In London conference who basically said that all men were rapists. Equally, there are left wing feminists who I think privately engage in ways that are destructive to “the movement”, despite agreeing with the views they put out into the public arena. Just as the left don’t have a monopoly on feminism, the right don’t have a monopoly on crappy politics.

Yay for diversity in feminism. Yes, for interest in the politics of gender, and interest in equality, however one may go about pursuing that interest.

http://rachelhills.tumblr.com/post/15684065749/margaret-thatcher-not-a-feminist

Feminism is tricky

2012-01-10T17:23:00.000-08:00

Here are the issues I’ve been thinking about.

I wrote a piece about the move in Europe towards banning the selling of sex, and the message that women are not for sale (a feminist victory), and that this movement is being opposed by sex workers who are lobbying for their rights to work within policies that protect their health and safety (feminist sex workers). (My sister is a health worker who works with sex workers.)

I’ve read about the Lingerie Football League, where women play American Football wearing very little and for free. Some feminists say this is demeaning to women and should be stopped. Some say better that women play sport themselves than just cheer for male sportsmen (even though cheerleaders are paid), and that if women choose to do this, they have the right.

I read the profile piece on Melinda Tankard Reist. What she stands for, and other feminists who oppose what she stands for. I agree with Melinda Tankard Reist on some issues, and disagree on others. I’m glad for the work she does about sexuality, children and pornography and the issues she raises for public discussion. I’ll add the links at the bottom of the post, but this conversation, for me, raises more question than it answers.

Abortion is never pleasant. It is violence that women choose when they are in a situation where they are pregnant but can’t see themselves raising a child, or raising another child. I agree that we need to talk more about the social context. Why is raising children only the concern of women? Why is our society structured in such a way that for a women to have a baby changes her whole life, who she is and what she can do? Why are men and the greater societal structure never discussed in the abortion debate? I’m not anti-abortion. I’m saying we need to look at context and move away form the yes/no arguments. Of course nobody should force a pregnant woman to have a child. If men and the greater society want a say in women’s reproduction, then men and the greater society need to create a world where women can have children without penalty. (And the mother penalty is a whole other post.)

Nora Ephron says you can’t call yourself a feminist if you don’t believe in the right to abortion. Wow. In my book you are a feminist if you believe in equal rights for women. If you call yourself a feminist, then you are, even though your feminism might be different from mine..Ephron is making a big call there. I’m not prepared to back her. At the f collective conference there was a motion (it wasn’t a meeting with an agenda or constitution) declaring Tankard Reist to not be a feminist. It felt dangerous and wrong for me. No evidence. No right of reply. I don’t think anyone has the authority to decide who is feminist and who isn’t.

Leslie Cannold says she can’t support Tankard Reist’ work because of her former work with former Tasmanian senator, Brian Harradine. On that basis, we wouldn’t talk to anyone we don’t have everything in common with. And how thoroughly do we know everybody we encounter anyway? I’d be pretty lonely if I only hung out with feminist atheist greenies/white mid-forties mothers, or only with people who had never done anything I disagreed with. I’d be pretty lonely if I had to disclose everything I’d ever done with every new acquaintance. I’m prepared to focus on commonalities. I don't see anyone dismiss what Eva Cox says on the basis that she lobbied for the privitisation of child care, which she admits was a mistake(personal conversation). How about playing the ball and not the player?

And here are the questions that really make me think.

Does one type of feminism have the right to over-rule what other women can or can’t do, for the common good? In the case of sex work or Lingerie Football League? Or is that too much like the patriarchy, telling women what they can and can't do?

And the point made by Eva Cox.

‘As high-profile second-waver Eva Cox puts it, it’s about the difference between “a view of feminism in which choices and opportunities are not determined by gender” – a group in which Cox includes herself – and “one that wants to protect women, whether it be from men, from sexuality or something else”, the world view she suspects Tankard Reist subscribes to.’

So, what kind of feminist am I? A bit of both?

I’ve been reading Cordelia Fine’s Delusions of Gender: The Real Science Behind Sex Difference. Dr Fine is an Australian cognitive neuroscientist. Here’s what she says.

About how stereotype threat affects performance on tests.

‘This can be done in disquiteningly naturalistic ways. Stereotype threat effects have been seen in women who: record their sex at the beginning of a quantitative test...; are in the minority as they take the test; have just watched women acting in air-headed ways in commercials, or have instructors or peers who hold - consciously or otherwise - sexist attitudes. (31-32)
‘Ads that trade in ditzy stereotypes of women also...reduce women’ interest in taking on a leadership role. Male and female university students were equally interested in leading a group - except for women exposed to the gender-stereotyped commercials, who were more likely to choose a nonleadership role instead.’ (43)

We already know that men seeing depictions of women treated callously, impersonally, as sex objects, means that they next treat women with less respect than they otherwise would. Even businesswomen are seen as less competent by men or boys who have just watched women in pornography, listened to misogynistic lyrics or played misogynistic video games (from the Growing Up Fat and Furious Conference). But if seeing women being ditzy impacts on women who don’t want to be ditzy, then we have a problem. So, perhaps we do need to overrule what some women want for the sake of all women. But, on the other hand, there will always be people who are giving their group a bad name, whether they be women, men, by nationality or religion. You can’t legislate against behaviour you might consider to be stupid or silly or demeaning. Can you? Or is it better to accept that all groups contain an infinite variety of individuals and we should stop categorising people, if that is possible?

So much more to talk about.

Okay, I have to go tend to my children now. But if you see me at the pool, this is what I want to talk about. All comments welcome.

http://rachelhills.wordpress.com/2012/01/08/whos-afraid-of-melinda-tankard-reist/

Summer Staycation: January is a round tuit

2012-01-10T01:44:00.000-08:00

We’ve stayed home these holidays. It means I’ve had time to do the things I haven’t had time to do during the year, knowing that once school starts we’ll be crazy busy once again. So, January is when I can get around to all the jobs I’ve said I’ll do when I get around to it.

I have steam cleaned the kitchen floor (Cyberguy found a steam cleaner in its box on the street - only the fabric cover was missing so I wrapped cloth nappies about it, held them with elastic bands, and Bob’s your uncle), vacuumed under the beds (and learned that even when I’m lying flat on the floor with the vacuum cleaner a child will say ‘Muuum’), cleaned out the kitchen cupboards, the pots and pans and cookbooks, done the mending - what a relief to get rid of the pile of mending - but I haven’t finished all the darning, yet. It all should make the school year run more efficiently.

And it means a chance to catch up with friends. Now I know that the local school friends use this time to see other people, and I have to remind the children that we aren’t their number one priority at the moment (in fact, we might just be handy locals to hang out with). So we try to see the friends who aren’t in our usual schooltime loop. Like last year I’ve organised three open house sessions on weekends, so that people can drop in if they are available. Because it is hard to keep track of who is where during the holidays - most people go away sometime - I figure this is an efficient way to do it. If people can’t come, at least they know that I’m interested in socialising with them. And it means that we clean up the house really well every week.

We’ve been hanging out at the pool. The children are nearly old enough that they can play in the big pool while I swim laps. I’ve been waiting for this for nearly twelve years. They are old enough that they can play in the kids’ pool and I don’t have to get in with them, as I have done for about ten years. But if they are in the big pool, Banjo can only just stand up in the shallow end, and I need to watch her. Matilda can now swim laps. I’m keen to join her.

And we’ve been having playdates. The kids now organise themselves and I can do other things. I used to plan the playdates and set up activities for them. Now they can even cook with their friends with minimal supervision. They’re at a lovely age. They’ve settled into the holidays enough that a game can go on for hours, and be taken up the following day.

I’m planning that we can do a few excursions before the holidays are over, because they really haven’t done much. These are the children who, when I suggested one holiday that we go to Luna Park that day, said no, they were busy playing in the backyard. But they’ll need something to write about their first week back at school, other than listing the books they’ve read, so we’d better go somewhere and do something.

So how about you? How are your holidays going? Do you schedule activities or just go with the flow?

Campaign against Typo porn

2012-01-08T15:07:00.000-08:00

Another day, another campaign against pornograghy.

Now it is the stationery shop, Typo (owned by Cotton On), that has a product line, called Dirty, depicting women as sex objects on drink bottles, notebooks and iphone covers.

Leave a comment on a their Facebook page.

Or sign here.

http://www.change.org/petitions/cotton-on-stop-selling-porn-themed-products

Extreme Parental Guidance: Sleep

2012-01-04T03:25:00.000-08:00

I watched this program this week. Supernanny Jo Frost helping parents to guide their children’s behaviour, so that family life is bearable, or even pleasant. You know the drill. But this new version includes studies by academics.

In this episode there was a sleep study conducted on nine children. They went to bed at 11pm for a week, then underwent a series of tests. They scored at levels three years below their ages.

Then, for a week, they went to bed at 7.30, lights out at 8pm, with no electronics in the bedroom. Undergoing the same tests, they scored at two years above their ages.

The academic said that instead of sending children to coaching colleges, parents could simply send the children to bed earlier.

Like adults, children aren’t ready to learn, to think, to behave well, when they are tired. They get overstimulated, overtired, jittery, and find it hard to focus.

As my friend says, it isn’t rocket science.

How are women going?

2012-01-04T03:05:00.000-08:00

This is one of those posts where I’ve read a few a things lately that seems to add up to a bigger picture about how women are going.

The commenters might be more informed and intelligent than the writer of the original article here, about how women have fared in 2011(briefly). The only part worth repeating is the stat that although women make up 40% of the world’s workforce, they own 1% of the wealth. This and the following comments about how religious women might be complicit with keeping women from power.

‘Having been part of the womens rights movement in the 60's it seems that we have lost more than we've gained. I was in Iran before the Shah was deposed and when women had equal rights , educated, received good medical care and were proud participants of government and business alike. I was in Israel where I was beaten up for not being an Israeli born Jewess, I was beaten and raped in Pakistan for being a white woman. In all this I had not yet turned 16. Still this is nothing compared to the scape-goating that women are receiving now in most parts of the world due to the abuse of power, religious fundamentalism and educational decline. Why are those in such positions of power so intent on keeping women from participating and decision making - what are they afraid of ? This is now a global catastrophy - look at our world now. What have women done to deserve this? I despair for us, now and the generations to come. Where are all you ladies of the sixties ? What did we fight for .... this !!!!! Come on women and all enlighted people everywhere and all you pioneers of the 60's. We didnt go through all that for women to be so abused and mistreated on every conceivable human level and practically all over the world. Forget the politicians - they are limited. We need a new kind of people powered women's revolution to aid our sisters the world over. I would start one if I knew more about tweets facebook etc, alas I am a uselss old maid when it comes to technology (I've only just mastered this comment stuff)- but I am sure there are those of you out there that can start a new womens social revolution to protect our sisters who suffer these dispicable outrages against their person and their fundamental human rights and liberty. Someone somewhere lets get together and take ACTION. Everyone women is important in this world and they need our help. All feasable constructive and ingenious ideas welcome.’

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/the-womens-blog-with-jane-martinson/2011/dec/27/2011-good-bad-and-breathtaking

Then I read Leslie Cannold's piece about gender equality under secular and religious law.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/faith-in-equality-a-must-20120101-1ph7l.html

And this piece from the site Women's Views News about the latest stats on gender equity in various countries.

http://www.womensviewsonnews.org/2011/12/sweden-and-yemen-at-the-top-and-bottom-of-the-undps-gender-inequality-index/

And a piece by man who writes for The Huffington Post about how women are put down by men, and a strategy he calls gaslighting, which belittles women's instincts and opinions.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yashar-hedayat/a-message-to-women-from-a_1_b_958859.html?ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false

All very well to identify the problems. I can understand the frustration of the commenter who was part of the women's movement in the 60s and despairs at the lack of progress. Where to from here?

What can we learn from schools in Finland?

2011-12-30T20:30:00.000-08:00

I wrote an essay last term about social class and education, and looked at the PISA stats, so I am interested in this article in The Atlantic about the Finnish go-to guy for western countries who want to improve their education systems. Very telling. A lot we in Australia, the only country in the world whose government financially supports private schools, can learn.

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/12/what-americans-keep-ignoring-about-finlands-school-success/250564/

...there was considerable interest in a recent visit to the U.S. by one of the leading Finnish authorities on education reform, Pasi Sahlberg, director of the Finnish Ministry of Education's Center for International Mobility and author of the new book Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn from Educational Change in Finland? Earlier this month, Sahlberg stopped by the Dwight School in New York City to speak with educators and students, and his visit received national media attention and generated much discussion.

Decades ago, when the Finnish school system was badly in need of reform, the goal of the program that Finland instituted, resulting in so much success today, was never excellence. It was equity.

Since the 1980s, the main driver of Finnish education policy has been the idea that every child should have exactly the same opportunity to learn, regardless of family background, income, or geographic location. Education has been seen first and foremost not as a way to produce star performers, but as an instrument to even out social inequality.

In the Finnish view, as Sahlberg describes it, this means that schools should be healthy, safe environments for children. This starts with the basics. Finland offers all pupils free school meals, easy access to health care, psychological counseling, and individualized student guidance.

In fact, since academic excellence wasn't a particular priority on the Finnish to-do list, when Finland's students scored so high on the first PISA survey in 2001, many Finns thought the results must be a mistake. But subsequent PISA tests confirmed that Finland -- unlike, say, very similar countries such as Norway -- was producing academic excellence through its particular policy focus on equity.

That this point is almost always ignored or brushed aside in the U.S. seems especially poignant at the moment, after the financial crisis and Occupy Wall Street movement have brought the problems of inequality in America into such sharp focus. The chasm between those who can afford $35,000 in tuition per child per year -- or even just the price of a house in a good public school district -- and the other "99 percent" is painfully plain to see.

Equity is the word.

Why isn’t there a radio station for children?

2011-12-29T19:29:00.000-08:00

Can you imagine a radio station for children? With different programs for different age groups and interests? With a science show, a book show, audio books, maybe an advice show, dance music, classical music, all sort of music that’s suitable for kids. It could use stories from adult radio that kids would be interested in, like the story of the artist who uses Lego. Stories from the ABC and BBC and USA radio shows. It would be brilliant.

Why doesn't it exist?

Geena Davis Insititue on Gender in Media

2011-12-29T19:22:00.000-08:00

Geena Davis is asking for support for her Institute on Gender in Media. Here's what she says.

I've been a lifelong advocate of women and girls. I am writing to ask you to join me by becoming a member of the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media.

While watching children's programming with my daughter who was 2 at that time, I was astounded to see a dearth of female characters in children's entertainment. This greatly concerned me and I was compelled to confirm my observations, so I commissioned the largest research study on gender in children's film and television ever undertaken. Our research proved the vast disparity I witnessed:

* There are 3 male characters for every 1 female character, even in top-grossing G-rated family films. This ratio has remained the same as it was just after World War II -- more than 65 years ago.

* Girls and women serve primarily as "eye candy." Female characters are almost six times as likely as males to be shown in revealing clothing. Consider this: female animated characters in G-rated films wear the same percentage of sexually revealing attire as R-rated live action characters.

* In G-rated family films from 2006-2009, female characters were not depicted with career occupations in the field of medical science, as a business leader, in law, or in politics.

* Females behind the camera are still scarce. Men outnumber women in key production roles by nearly 5 to 1. Only 7% of directors, 13% of writers, and 20% of producers are female. However, when one woman writer works on a film, there is a 10% increase in on-screen time female characters.

There is a general consensus among health professionals, researchers and educators that high levels of exposure to negative images are related to detrimental outcomes for children and adults. These outcomes impact self-esteem, academic performance, body image, social and cultural behaviors and beliefs and will ultimately impact future life and occupational choices for women.

The Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media is the only research organization working collaboratively with entertainment media industry leaders to engage, educate and influence them to recognize the need for gender balance, address stereotyping and objectification, and produce a wide variety of female characters for entertainment targeting children 11 and under.

Media can also create positive opportunities to overcome social and cultural barriers - and that is what the Institute is striving for. Our workshops and consulting with leading media companies and corporations are influencing how they portray media. In a survey following the 2010 Symposium, over 90% of attendees stated that the information they learned would influence how they perceive gender balance and stereotypes in their work and 98% would share and utilize our research findings with their peers and in their companies.

Please take action today to affect how girls and women are portrayed in the media, one of the most powerful forces shaping girl's perception of themselves and their role in society. Exposure to negative images in the media impact self-esteem, academic performance, body image, and social and cultural behaviors and beliefs - all of which ultimately impact future life and occupational choices for women.

Here are some ways you can help:

* Sign up for the Institute's Smart Brief on Gender in Media, a free weekly briefing on the important issues in gender in media.

* Get involved in one of our educational classroom outreach programs designed to inform and empower. View the first video in our children's educational video series. This video debuted in 8,500 middle and high schools reaching 6 million students via Channel One. In 2012, this series will be expanded and launched in partnership with ITVS and PBS's Women and Girls Lead campaign.

* Become an active contributor in the pursuit of gender equality today. Make a donation. Every dollar helps us fund research and educational outreach efforts that will make a difference for girls.

Family Ties

2011-12-23T00:36:00.001-08:00

We watched an episode of Family Ties today. In it, Jennifer, who is 16, becomes aware of what is going on that is damaging the environment. She points out the toxins in toiletries and talks about how burning fossil fuels is creating greenhouse gas emissions that trap heat in the Earth's atmosphere, causing temperatures to rise. Her parents were trying to use goods that were eco-friendly, but were concerned that Jennifer was becoming depressed. She saw her school counsellor, told him what is going on and made him depressed. The show concluded with the parents telling Jennifer that the planet needed her to stay active for change and help find solutions.

The show was made in 1989.

National Year of Reading 2012

2011-12-21T15:23:00.000-08:00

My local library has asked me to be a supporter of the library for the National Year of Reading 2012. What a lovely honour. I've accepted.

This means lending my name and image to promotional material, being available to attend, and perhaps speak at, events, and generally encouraging reading as required. I've had a very enjoyable relationship with my local library over the years, and I'm happy to do whatever they want that they might consider useful.

The launch date is 14 February, Library Lovers Day.

The National Patron is William McInnes, and the NSW State Ambassadors are Richard Glover and Susanne Gervay.

For more info on the National Year of Reading, see here.

www.love2read.org.au

News roundup

2011-12-21T02:07:00.000-08:00

Enough navel gazing. Time to look up and see what’s going on in the world, courtesy, mostly, of the last few editions of The Guardian Weekly. I’ve leave out the news of the Eurozone and major world events. More on big picture news later. Here are some smaller stories.

* Tokelau, a Pacific micro-state of 1,500 people, has announced that it has planned to switch entirely to renewable energy. Energy will come from solar panels and coconut oil. It plans to lead the world in renewable energy and in carbon emissions savings per person. The island has the most to lose due to climate change and rising sea levels. Inhabitants have no intention of leaving and want to preserve their culture for future generations. They are sending a message and setting an example. There are three cars on the island.

* One in three children in the UK does not own a book. More girls than boys are bookless. This is up from one in ten in 2005. Children who have their own books are more likely to do better at school.

* Liking vegetables may begin in the womb. What mothers eat whilst pregnant can shape their children’s food preferences. Researchers say that prenatal flavour learning can impact on rates of diabetes and obesity.

* In the UK the divorce rate is up for the first time in seven years. The recession is being blamed.

* Metallica and The Red Hot Chilli Peppers have brought forward their European tours in order to not lose money from the falling euro.

* France is aiming to follow Sweden and Iceland in banning prostitution.

* Sylvia Plath’s drawing have been exhibited and sold in London. They’re good. Is it any more personal for fans to have her artworks than her writing?

And two links.

One about workers in factories that make toys in China.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/04/chinese-toy-factories-christmas-disney

And one about the the top ten women of 2011. Lots of women active for change.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/gallery/2011/dec/16/women-of-year-2011-in-pictures?fb_action_ids=10150558153906929&fb_action_types=news.reads&fb_source=other_multiline

Why celebrate Christmas at all?

2011-12-19T17:12:00.000-08:00

While I’m being such a Grinch, and banging on about how Christmas doesn’t have a meaning for me beyond being with family (I’m not a Northern Hemisphere pagan, not a Christian, not into Santa, and don’t like creating lots of waste), I have to ask myself why we celebrate Christmas at all? It’s a serious question.

Part of my answer is that, here in the Southern Hemisphere, Christmas is tied up with the end of year celebrations, because of the school year. The two become merged, to an extent. We celebrate the completions, the achievements of the year. I imagine it would be easier if the two events were separate, as in the Northern Hemisphere where the school year goes from September until August. Celebrating Christmas is a mid year break rather than end of year break. (And I’ve always wondered about why JK Rowling included Christmas in her Harry Potter stories. Why did they celebrate Christmas in the wizarding world?) I think that if we lived in the Northern Hemisphere we could celebrate as pagans, and enjoy the festivities during the cold and dark of winter. But it also means we could think about end of school year celebrations without thinking about Christmas.

The rest of the answer is simply to get along with people. When a celebration is meaningful to people in a real way (I’m discounting Santa here), you don’t want to be critical about what they do. It is a matter of respect, and live and let live. For many people who aren’t pagan or Christian, Christmas has always been a time of being with family. It’s kind of shorthand for a family gathering. The members of the family acknowledge each other, and the year that’s been. We go along with it because we like spending time with family at the end of the year, when it is a holiday (everything is closed) and we can relax, and we don’t question it too much so as not upset family members. To do anything else would be surly and offensive.

Of course, for people who aren’t with family at Christmas, and find their own thing to do with friends, or who watch movies or go to the beach or serve breakfast at a homeless shelter, I think that’s fine. I wouldn’t want to push the ‘Christmas is about family’ message onto anyone else. I’m just saying this is the way I can justify participating in celebrations.

We talk about peer pressure in regards to children and teenagers, but what about peer pressure on adults who are just trying to fit in, whether they are migrants trying to assimilate or people just trying to placate family members. So, I admit it, I celebrate Christmas because of peer pressure. Not to the extent of buying candy canes and single use table settings, but to the extent of having a tree and exchanging gifts.

Considering it is women who do most of the work to make Christmas celebrations happen, I wonder what would happen if women cut back a little. Would men care enough about celebrating Christmas (I mean the food and gifts and making social arrangements part, not the religious part) to step up and fill the gap, or would the whole season tone down a notch or ten, because most men don't really care enough to bother doing it themselves. Hmmm. Could be the way to go. Women really do run themselves ragged over preparing for Christmas. I'm sure it isn't all necessary. It might be worth checking that other people really care about and appreciate the work women do for Christmas. (I'm not talking about myself here, because I don't do very much.) But I think it is worth suggesting that, if we find most women are organising Christmas celebrations merely because they think they are expected to, then we need to think about whether that is a good enough reason.

What would happen if women went on strike next Christmas?

Surely, the celebrations around December 25th have been through a lot of changes over the centuries, and can handle one or two more?

What else could we do but make it about family?

PS. I need to balance this now with Stephanie Dowrick's tips for Christmas calm.

http://thehoopla.com.au/10-tips-christmas-calm/#comments

The Book of Rachael: A Novel

2011-12-19T01:48:00.000-08:00

I wrote my Masters thesis on rewriting female characters from Greek mythology (Christa Wolf’s Cassandra) so was interested in reading Leslie Cannold’s fictional construction of Jesus’ sister. I saw the documentary that Cannold saw which inspired her to explore the idea of Jesus having a sister, and imagining what it was like to live as a women at the time of Jesus. It was a documentary about the historical Jesus, which mentioned that he probably had brothers and sisters, but to record the names of the sisters would be akin to recording the names of one’s sheep. She did her research on the politics, geography, religious practices, society, food, implements, dwellings, agriculture, and tribal interactions of the time. The result is worth reading. Cannold did the better job, given she states her inspiration and aims like Wolf did. The Book of Rachael: A Novel is the greater success and more enjoyable read.

I’ve also been reading a lot about the historical Jesus, and I’ve been watching the BBC documentary on the historiocity of the bible. I find it fascinating that the existence of one man two thousand years ago changed the history of the world, to the extent that our calendar is based around him. It is a rather peculiar phenomenon, and the story of the growth of Christianity is one which has had many twists and turns in history. The religion could have died out at many different points, but didn’t.

I’m aware that there are many people who take the bible literally, and see the hand of God in its compilation. The stories would have been oral stories which were told in order to explain the mysteries of life or provide comfort to ancient people. The rituals were a type of law used to control people. The stories have been transcribed and translated. The books of the bible have been selected and compiled. And, of course, the church itself has fractured and changed according to time and place, society and politics, and continues to do so.

There is historical evidence for aspects of Greek mythology: the golden fleece, the falling of Troy. Ancient Greek mythologies were told in many ways by many writers. The same characters appear in different versions of stories, much like the stories of Jesus being told by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Many stories of Greek mythology have not survived,. Many were probably burnt at the library of Alexandria, or simply lost. It is thought that gospels were also lost, or left behind, based on decisions we will ever know the thinking behind.

The story Leslie Cannold tells reminds us that Jesus existed in a specific time and place. That there was a specific geopolitical context. That Jesus stood up to injustice, offered hope to the downtrodden and embraced those who were outcast. He was compassionate to women. Christianity offered an alternative to the harsh laws of Judaism. Much about the new religion was attractive. The need for community and ritual is everpresent in human history and hasn’t left us yet.

She also reminds us of a time when women had no rights. In Jerusalem today there are still ultra-orthodox Jews who demand that women be excluded from the public sphere. Although gender segregation is outlawed, it is done informally, with women sitting at the back of the bus, using separate entrances and waiting rooms from men, being unable to speak at funerals, and women are not to sing or dance in mixed groups.

While men are trying to silence women and keep them out of public life, the women are protesting by singing and dancing. Other women are trying to write women back into historical stories, and the world keeps turning.

Middle Aged Spread is Real

2011-12-16T20:15:00.000-08:00

I was a skinny kid, but put on weight as a teenager. In my last years of high school I would come home from school and sleep, then get up when the family had gone to bed. I also spent many school days sleeping at sick bay. I guess I was depressed. When I started work, I spent money on food and alcohol. My first job was with the Public Service and the office lift went straight down to a bar. Very handy.

When I hit ten and a half stone, and my ex-boyfriend had set his date to return from overseas, I joined a gym near work. I worked out a few times a week. I would get myself weighed on the way to work at Woolworths every Monday morning. There was a weighing machine with a man attending who would write down your weight on a slip of paper. I still have that record of my weight slowly dropping from ten and a half stone to eight and a half. I’m only five foot two, so that was significant. We have a family portrait hanging up at my parents’ house taken when I was fat. My sister, on showing a friend around the house, said, ‘And here is a photo taken when Catherine was a blob.’ Nice.

I think I only had that gym membership for a year (because then I moved into a share house with musicians at Darlinghurst, and I guess going to the gym was not cool), but I learned that going to the gym can work for me, even though I do think it is a bit strange to pay to exercise in a specific place when people have always just exercised as part of everyday life. When I was at acting school a few years later and working shift work in various jobs I had a gym memberships again. I remember feeling miffed that they were closed on Christmas Day. I was in catsuit-on-stage condition. Then again when I was at uni in a country town I had a gym membership. I remember walking through the snow to go to the gym, and going even when I had stitches after getting a mole removed. I was keen.

I’m thinking that being overweight didn’t suit me. Here is my mother’s farewell advice when I left for uni.

Mum: Bye. Don’t get fat.
Me: What about ‘don’t sleep with your lecturers?’
Mum: You can handle that. But if you get fat you’ll be unhappy.

By the time I had kids my metabolism had changed. Then, for many years, I was sleep deprived and hardly sat down. I think I started putting on weight when the youngest was a preschooler and more sure of walking around in the world. And I didn’t eat sweets or drink alcohol. I went through at least ten Easters without eating chocolate. I gave up drinking during my first pregnancy and just never got back into it. And I never weighed myself.

I remember a long time ago Kathleen Turner talking about her weight. She said that at a certain age you had to choose between your butt and your face. If your butt was trim, your face was gaunt. If you want a fuller face you need a bigger butt. That was in the days when no-one but Cher used Botox. (I remember seeing an interview with Cher, thinking, she’s so regal - she barely moves the muscles in her face. Little did we know...) Anyway. I’m up to that age.

I’m getting bigger around the middle for no good reason, except age. I’ve had a gym membership for the last year, and even though I’ve not been doing the sweatier classes that I did when I was younger (80s Step took a toll on my knees, childbirth on my bladder) my weight and measurements are the same as when I started. I don’t eat much sugar now, but I do pop a square of fair trade organic chocolate into my mouth occasionally. I’ve been going to the gym mostly to feel good and stretch out my back (I fractured my tailbone birthing my middle child). I’m letting my membership expire because I can’t justify the expense when we don’t know what’s happening financially for us this year. So, I’ll be moving on to swimming, yoga at home, walking, maybe some dance classes, and exercise videos. I’ve been reading David Gillespie’s Sweet Poison, so maybe I’ll cut out sugar and see what happens. I don’t like the idea of being addicted to anything except tea, so, maybe I’ll try giving up the little bit of sugar I now consume and see what happens. My friend has lost a few kilos by following his advice.

Or maybe I’ll happily keep eating sugar for the sake of my face.

It isn’t only the religious who protest the sexualised portrayal of women

2011-12-15T19:40:00.000-08:00

I’ve read a few articles lately about young women joining the convent. Each has mentioned the way women are presented so sexually in our society. Perhaps there is more to it than receiving a calling from God. Perhaps women might look to convents when they want to step back from the way women are expected to be sexual in our culture. I know, being raised as Catholic, I’ve thought about how lovely it would be if I could live in a protected community, amongst women, and not have to worry about relationships with males (takes up so much time) and get on with working for the institution (doing some public good), and having time for my own intellectual and creative pursuits, as I’ve witnessed those in religious institutions can do. I do like institutions and communal living. I can understand the appeal of joining a convent.

I also recently saw a UK documentary on Compass by a film-maker about his brother becoming a Muslim extremist. It showed his brother’s progress from vague discontentment with modern life to finding community and communal action for social change and preparing to be a terrorist. One of his first prompts towards Islamic extremism was his objection to the way women are presented in our society. An objection I share.

Then there was a piece on The Hoopla by a mum about the highly sexualised music played at her child’s primary school disco. The title was “I’m going Amish and Taking my Daughter with me’. I can understand the feeling that there are aspects of modern life you want to protect your child from.

I thought the issue of speaking out against the disrespectful portrayal of women was a common sense issue. A feminist issue. A lets be a good society by protecting children issue. I don’t see that protesting against sexualised images of women is a religious issue.

I know Collective Shout keeps up campaigns against various businesses that display women in disrespectful ways, whether that be on t shirts, advertisements, music videos. I know Melinda Tankard Reist is a Christian, but she never mentions religion on the Collective Shout site. I consider their work to be feminist, not religious, and I support what they do. I’m glad that religious groups speak out in protest of the sexualised portrayal of women we see in our culture. I’m glad for the work of whatever group supports the cause. How unfortunate, then, that when the Australian Christian Lobby speaks out, peoples’ reactions are as ignorant as those on the comments listed here, on the Courier Mail site reporting on the protest against Adidas selling t shirts with slogans such as ‘Boobies make me smile’ and images of Kate Moss with exposed nipples.

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/family-groups-teed-off-by-sleazy-shirts/comments-e6freon6-1226219043861

Many comments ridicule or mock the religious protesters. While I don’t agree with the Australian Christian Lobby on many points (in fact I would argue with them on most), I agree with them on this one, and thank them for the work they are doing. It is poor thinking to dismiss the argument because the group protesting is religious.

We need to change the message that it is only religious groups who oppose this.

Where are all the other groups and individuals who are protesting? Where are the education campaigns to let people know that portraying women in this way is not ok? We need some other voices here. Second wave feminism was onto this issue. When did we stop calling it a feminist issue? And we need to let people know there are ways of protesting without turning to religious institutions. Secular people care about women too.

2011 Cultural Round-Up

2011-12-14T02:40:00.000-08:00

I’ve been looking through the end-of-year lists of books of the year and cds of the year, so thought I’d present a cultural round up. Save you some time and trouble, and ask for your feedback.

Cds of the year

Women have topped a few of the lists for releases of the year in the music publications lits (Rolling Stone, Q, plus the Guardian etc). The bulk of the lists are music by blokes, but some female artists rate highly, and in all lists.

Florence & The Machine - Ceremonials
Adele - 21
St Vincent - Strange Mercy
Laura Marling - A Creature I Don’t Know
Gillian Welch - The Harrow & the Harvest
Kate Bush - Words for Snow
PJ Harvey - Let England Shake
Bjork - Biophilia

All worth listening to, I reckon, and would make good gifts.

I’d add some more.

Rumer - Seasons of my Soul
Seeker Lover Keeper
Joan as Policewoman - The Deep Field
The Unthanks

SMH had a little article about how well women recording artists are doing, with mention of Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and Beyonce. I reckon we’ve all heard enough abohttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifut them. Others on my list are more interesting to me.

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/music/now-its-women-who-are-top-of-the-pops-20111210-1oolf.html

Can you tell I only buy cds by women?

Books of the year

These are the books that appear a few times on various lists. I read male as well as female writers. But predominately I read female. I haven’t read a lot of fiction this year. Studying. But these from the lists appeal. I’ve got the Ali Smith from the library.

The Stranger’s Child- Alan Hollinghurst
The Wine of Solitude - Irene Nemirovsky
There But For The - Ali Smith
A Visit from the Goon Squad - Jennifer Egan
The Sense of an Ending - Julian Barnes

And two non-fiction
What is Madness? - Darian Leader
(sic) - Joshua Cody

A big year for shows

Well, I said at the beginning of the year that I want to go out more, and see shows, and I have.

I’ve seen concerts: Bat for Lashes, Joan as Policewoman, kd lang, Sufjan Stevens, tributes to Nick Drake and Leonard Cohen. I loved all of them.

I’ve seen plays: Lady Nerd, The Threepenny Opera, Motherhood: The Musical, Silent Disco, Speaking in Tongues, Mary Poppins, In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play.

I have to say it; I’m truly over the use of projected filming of actors on stage during performances. I get it, people. Move on. Threepenny Opera, I’m looking at you, but I believe Kevin Spacey's Richard III does it too. Hmmm. I don’t know that I’ll be seeing any mainstream theatre next year. It really is too expensive. I’ll try for some independent, and performance events put on by The Arts Unit, and some free talks at Belvoir and the Opera House. That might be all.

So, how have you fared with cultural events this year? Any shows or books or cds you’ve particularly enjoyed? Anything you've missed and hope to catch up on?

We aren’t easy to market to

2011-12-13T19:41:00.000-08:00

The kids and I recently filled in some Roy Morgan surveys. There were lots of sections we could skip because we don’t have mobile phones, buy apps, buy alcohol, watch pay tv, support a footy team, buy magazines and so on. I know the survey is to provide information to marketers, but the marketers will have to work harder to find us.

When asked, the kids stated they don’t have a favourite superhero or cartoon character. Good.

One of the questions asked of the children was ‘what is cool?’ Banjo answered Fancy Nancy, and Katie Morag. Clancy said Horrible Histories. Matilda said Harry Potter and The Hobbit.

Most the shows I watch are on the ABC or SBS. I don’t do a lot of shopping. I buy groceries at Aldi, fruit and veg at the greengrocers, bread at the bakery, and most other purchases are second hand.

I reckon it is worthwhile giving our view to marketers. We’re just not very interested.

Go Go Stop

2011-12-12T18:14:00.000-08:00

We’ve been crazy busy. We’ve managed to keep up with everything. Just. Peddling to go from one event to the next. Keeping the wheels turning. But what it means is that we’ve had no time to process anything. Our feet aren’t touching the ground.

We’ve had: White Ribbon Day event at school (for which a brochure I wrote about children and the media was distributed), dress rehearsals and performance for dance school (I spent the concert helping my children change costumes and making ballet buns - which mercifully stayed in this year - and taking ballet buns out), band playing at local Christmas carols event, music exams, Harry Potter exhibition (I want to go again), school concert for infants, Matilda campaigning for school officer (and a reminder that parents don’t vote for school officers - trust the school that the system works as it is, and be gracious to those who won positions - as my wise friend says, we’re supposed to be teaching the children how to cope with these things, not inflaming controversy to no good end - we don't want to become cheerleader moms!), school presentation day , school reports, attending birthday parties.

I’ve had: the printing and selling of the fruit and veg cookbook I made as a P&C fundraiser, release of my uni results, babysitting for other mums through the babysitting club, school volunteer thank you morning tea (the closest I’ll get to a work Christmas party), band supervision, specialist appointment for Banjo, organising to attend the Ethics teacher training course, then cancelling because Clancy has tonsillitis, Clancy’ birthday afternoon tea (at which her friends played hide and seek and Chinese whispers - I served them food and French Lemonade and left them to entertain themselves, and they did!), chairing the AGM for a committee I’ve just resigned from, uniform shop stocktake, and trying to get the washing dry during weeks of rain.

No wonder I’m tired.

Fortunately Christmas for us isn’t crazy. It is very casual. I get presents for the kids and my sisters and myself, which I’ve done. I haven’t got anything for Cyberguy because he says he doesn’t want anything (and he’s very fussy). For Christmas day we all bring food to share with family, and no-one is fussed about what that food is. That’s it.

When school ends on Friday, and our schedule becomes a ghost town with tumbleweed whistling through it, we might look back on the happenings of the last few weeks and process what it all means. Or we might just sleep in and eat lovely food and get ready for everything that will be happening next year. Which will be crazy busy.

Attachment

2011-12-02T04:22:00.000-08:00

I got my hair cut this week. I say this week, because it usually takes a few days for me to get my hair cut because I always find the cut is uneven or weird somehow, so I have to go back and get it cut again. I’m not particularly attached to my hair, even though I’m told it’s distinctive. Thick, dark, curly. I’ve worn it long, I’ve worn it short, I’ve worn it red, platinum blond and electric blue, but these days, I’m naturally dark and naturally greying, and I can’t stand to have hair in my face so, once it gets to a certain length (looking like Ritchie Blackmore, as it always does), it has to go. And it has to be short. Elizabeth Taylor in the 50s short. Hair like my mother’s short. No compromise. I think hairdressers might be worried I’m scared of having short hair, but I always tell them I’m not. I probably was as a child, with short curly hair and sticking out ears, but I got my ears pinned back when I was in my early twenties (cosmetic surgery known as ‘correction of batwing deformity’ which was much more painful than I could have imagined, particularly in ways I hadn’t foreseen - I’ll just say if you know someone who wants this procedure done, I recommend getting it done before becoming sexually active). Anyway, I’m not attached to my hair.

Books, however, are another matter. My daughter asked that I get rid of some books, and I looked at her like she suggested I amputate my leg. I did get rid of a few books that were old and mouldy and shouldn’t be inside anyone’s house, but that’s as far as I’m prepared to go.

My partner, on the other hand is attached to his hair, but not to possessions. He has few clothes and other items. But he has long hair and doesn’t get it cut. Ever.

So as an example for the children we cover both angles.

Attachment. It’s a funny thing.

Women in the Movies

2011-11-25T23:42:00.000-08:00

From an article in The Huffington Post, telling us what we probably already knew. Don't bother reading the objectional comments

A study released by USC's Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism took a survey of the 4,342 speaking characters in the top 100 grossing films of 2009 and compared it to results from the top 100 films of 2007 and 2008. For women, nothing much has changed -- in these top films, 32.8 percent of actors are female and 67.2 are male -- 2.05 males to every one female. This means that less than 17 percent of films are gender balanced, even though females make up half of the ticket-buying population.
Perhaps more disturbing is the finding that women are much more frequently sexualized when they appear on screen. They're more likely to be seen in sexy clothing (25.8 percent to men at 4.7 percent) and more likely to be partially naked (23.6 percent to 7.4 percent)...

Part of the problem may be the serious gender gap that exists in the movie business as a whole. "Gender equality does not exist behind the camera," the study wrote, looking at 1,240 positions to reach the conclusion. Only 3.6 percent of directors are female, only 13.5 percent of writers are female and only 21.6 percent of producers are female. No change has occurred in these figures over the past three years. The study also found that films with one more female screenwriters shows a 10.2 percent increase in female presence in films -- a suggestion that if things were to change behind the camera, they could also change in front.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/22/women-film-study-annenberg_n_1107899.html

According to the Geena Davis Institute, in family films there is 1 female character for every 3 male characters.

http:http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif//www.thegeenadavisinstitute.org/

Have a look at the Bechdel test. The idea is to ask, when watching a movie, are there at least two female characters who have names, do they talk to each other and do they talk to each other about something other than men?

http://www.feministfrequency.com/2009/12/the-bechdel-test-for-women-in-movies/

So, we talk about how women should make porn, but we have so few women working in mainstream films, and the film industry, how about we address that first. I'm sure there are as many women as men studying film-making. What happens when they graduate? Or are women veiwers complicit in this bias, because women see 'men's films' but men don't see 'women's films'?

What do you think?

Women in Ancient Greece, Facebook and White Ribbon Day

2011-11-23T17:31:00.000-08:00

I recently attended an illustrated lecture on Women in Ancient Athens.

Here are some notes from the lecture.

The average age for marriage for an Anthenian woman was 14.
The average age of death was 36 (45 for a man).
In 5th C BC, out of the propertied families, the ratio of girl children to boy children was 1 girl to 5 boys, which indicates that female infanticide was a common practice.

This statistic made me think. The practice of female infanticide is currently common in China and India. I’ve read recently that a predominately male society is not a good place to be in. Women are treated like chattel. Wives are shared between bothers. Prostitution is high. In Ancient Athens abandoned girl babies would be rescued by brothel owners and raised to work in brothels. Prostitutes were routinely beaten by customers. Men drank out of cups with pornographic images on them at their drinking parties where prostitutes were brought in for entertainment and abuse, while the women of the household were in the women’s quarters of the house. So here’s my problem. We think of 5th C BC Athens as the pinnacle of the ancient world, in terms of culture and politics and higher order thinking. How is this possible when women were treated so appallingly?

Here are some quotes from the time.

‘The two best days in a woman’s life are when someone marries her and when he carries her dead body to the grave.’ - Ephesus, 6th C BC

‘She kept house and worked wool.’ Inscription on woman’s grave, 5th C BC Athens

‘Your great glory is not to be inferior to what God has made you, and the greatest glory of a woman is to be least talked about by men, whether they are praising you or criticising you.’ From Perikles’ Funeral Oration 430BC, Thucydides II.45.2

So, the greatest honour for a woman was to be silent and invisible.

Which leads me to what Melinda Tankard Reist wrote recently about men’s t-shirts, in an article about the need for White Ribbon Day.

Rape-proud T shirts collapse rape into a punch line, adorned with slogans: “It’s not rape, it’s surprise sex” and “It’s not rape if you yell surprise”. The text promoting the second reads:
“Remember to yell! Now we know this is a little controversial, but you know you’re laughing. Just remember to let them know before you go for it. I’m sure they’ll appreciate the effort.”
Other T shirts feature images of women gagged and half naked, sold by Roger David. Porn-inspired “T.I.T.S” t.shirts are sold in youth skate stores, including this charmer, “Relax it’s just sex”, depicting the bound body of a naked woman spattered in blood.
City Beach has a t-shirt with a woman with a black eye, crying. The slogan reads: “It’s only illegal if you get caught”. “Bitches get stiches” is another title on T shirts in youth stores.

And here’s what is on Facebook.

There are many Facebook sites promoting violence against women: “Cleaning foundation off your sword after a hard day of hunting sluts”, “Dragging slut’s into you’re room unconscious in a sack” (sic), “Kicking sluts in the vagina because its funny watching your foot disappear”, “You know she’s playing hard to get when she takes out a restraining order”, “I like my women how I like my Scotch, 10 years old and locked in my basement”, “What’s 10 inches and gets girls to have sex with me? My knife”, “I know a silly little b—ch that needs a good slap”.
Some of these were removed after 20,000 people signed petitions calling on Facebook to remove them, but many similar pages cropped up shortly after, such as “Throwing eggs at sluts, brick shaped eggs - made from brick”, which invites people to rate other users’ photos with comments like “drown” or “hit… With a shovel”.
A Pippa Middleton Ass appreciation Society page on Facebook was set up in honour of the sister and bridesmaid of Kate Middleton, attracting tens of thousands of members. Men described all the things they wanted to do to the 29 year old, including injuring her so much she would need “straw and a wheelchair”.

http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/Violence-against-women-is-endemic-to-our-sick-culture/

So, two and half thousand years later, and we don’t seem to have come very far in terms of respect for women, have we.

My holiday reading has begun.

2011-11-23T16:20:00.000-08:00

I feel a bit strange when I don't get to read novels. Before I was at uni, this time, I was reading at least two books a month. During my first degree I was supposed to read three books a week. While I have been reading lots with my study, it just isn't the same. I know, now that uni is over, I should be Spring cleaning, but hey, it's raining (who feels like cleaning in the rain?), so I'm reading.

I think I’m a bit carried away though, because, in my enthusiasm, I’ve taken too many books out of library.

This is what I've taken out:

Shirley Jackson - We Have Always Lived in the Castle
anthology from seven countries put together by Plan - Because I am a Girl
Ayelet Waldman - Love & Other Impossible Pursuits
Elizabeth Bishop - poems
Geoffrey Blainey - A Short History of Christianity (only 600 pages short)
Jonathon Safran Foer - Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
Judith Lanigan - A True History of the Hula Hoop

This is what I've put on hold or on my wishlist:

Leslie Cannold - The Book of Rachel
Cordelia Fine - Delusions of Gender
Shirley Jackson - The Lottery
Natalie Haynes - Ancient Guide to Modern Life
Bettany Hughes - The Hemlock Cup: Socrates, Athens and the Search for the Good Life (I'm a bit excited that Bettany Hughes is presenting the program on women in the Bible on tv this Sunday night!)

I've just read We Have Always Lived in the Castle, and wonder how it comes to pass that I hadn't read it before now. I love it. It's short and gripping, and creates such a world. It fits in well with some of my other favourites - works by Carson McCullers, Harper Lee, Toni Morrison, Salinger (I'm still waiting for those manuscripts to be posthumously published!), Steinbeck - and I want to read more of Shirley Jackson.

Have you read any of these books? What's on your reading list this holidays?

Kill Santa

2011-11-21T15:51:00.000-08:00

If you were to meet an alien who asked you to explain Santa in Australia, what would you say?

The older I get, the more I wonder about Santa and how we celebrate Christmas in Australia. It is very peculiar. I’ve had to think about it because I have curious children. When my oldest child was five she asked me ‘If Christmas celebrates Jesus’ birthday, when is Santa’s birthday?’ Good question. And soon after: ‘Mum, is Santa real? Just tell me the truth.’ Figuring it is important that she trust me, I told her, then had to try to explain. She asked why parents routinely lie to their children. Why is the lie so embedded that everyone plays along, so much so that post offices and shopping malls pretend Santa is real? Why do parents do the work of thinking about what their children want, and earning the money to pay for it, and buying the gifts and hiding them, then transfer all the credit to a fictional character? Why wouldn’t you want your children to know the gifts are from their parents, who love them? Why would you teach children to be wary of strangers, tell them to not allow strangers into the house, then welcome an unknown man who sneaks inside when everyone is asleep? Why do parents insist their children sit on the lap of a man they don’t know, smile and be photographed? Why do we pretend that Christmas is a cold and snowy celebration, that Santa wears a woolly suit, and we decorate with fake snow and eat heavy meals, and sing carols by candlelight when it is is the middle of summer and the sun sets at 8pm? Why do we sing about reindeer and sleigh bells during a heatwave?

It makes sense in the northern hemisphere where it is the middle of winter. Where it gets dark at 3pm and everyone feels the need for some festive cheer to help them through the cold and dark of winter. But it doesn’t make sense in Australia.

When we know the earth has limited resources why do we cover our houses in decorative lights and buy lots of gifts people don’t want and wrap them in paper that will end up in the bin? Sometimes I wonder. If we were trying to trash the earth, we probably couldn’t come up with a better way than the way we celebrate Christmas. The gift guides that include a section on ethical gifts are a little perplexing. Does that mean that all the other gift sections are unethical?

My daughter is now eleven, and I can send her into paroxysms of frustration by telling her about the conversations on the mum forums about ‘the magic of Christmas’ and mums defending their right to lie to their children for ‘the magic of childhood’ and how they are glad to keep their children believing in Santa until they are ready to start high school, because, after that point, their children would be a target for ridicule. They say that ‘Santa is real if you believe he is real’, the logic of which makes her mind spin. Try substituting another word for ‘Santa’: monsters/ghosts/my talent/my fat. She appreciates good thinking.

The best I can say about Santa is that he provides an example of how mythology turns into tradition and standard practice. How beliefs and rituals can move from one country to another. How they can combine with other beliefs and rituals, merge and morph and grow, and lose meaning on the way. He stands as an example of how these things can spread, and change in significance.

I’m not suggesting we ditch Christmas. My kids are looking forward to it; the presents and seeing the extended family. I’m just saying lets celebrate in a way that is meaningful to us, according to what we believe and where we are.

NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into Ethics Classes

2011-11-15T14:50:00.000-08:00

The ethics class was introduced into NSW Public Schools to address the discriminatory policy which stated that children not attending Special Religious Education (SRE) were to be taught nothing. I hope Rev Fred Nile would oppose such discrimination whether it be by gender, race or creed.

Now the classes are running, and the churches find they had nothing to worry about because they didn’t lose bums on seats, (and for no other reason they were arguing before the introduction of the classes). Rev Fred Nile will lead a parliamentary inquiry into the ethics course in NSW primary schools, which he believes is a ‘fraud’. He says parents don’t understand the course and its implications.

I think he will find parents do understand. They understand their children were discriminated against.

If Rev Fred Nile believes he has the right to interfere with the ethics course, why is he not also looking into all the other courses offered during the SRE timeslot? Is he concerned with the curriculum for Buddhism, Islam, Judaism? Would that help make public schools more inclusive and encourage respect for diversity? Does he disapprove of teaching children critical thinking in Literacy, HSIE and PDHPE? Is he concerned about the content of the ethics course? I could remind him that it is in SRE that children are taught about stonings for adultery, virgin birth, crucifixion, child sacrifice, and hell, but I don't have the right to criticise any SRE curriculum. I have the right to not enrol my child in that course and to attend ethics class instead. Is it helpful to call any SRE curriculum a ‘fraud’ or is the point of SRE, and the ethics class and the public school system that we can all live and work and learn together even though we have different beliefs, so long as we respect those differences and acknowledge our commonalities?

I think the inquiry will find that children in ethics are given an opportunity to think, just as they are in other classes at NSW primary schools, and there will be no action taken. The inquiry is just a waste of time and money.

What not to buy for Christmas

2011-11-14T18:33:00.000-08:00

Collective Shout has collated the businesses they've had reason to protest against this year, and made a list of them, as a reminder to not buy from these companies when doing your Christmas shopping. The reason? Sexism, sexual objectification or downright being insulting to women.

Thanks Collective Shout.

http://collectiveshout.org/2011/11/crossem-off-your-list/

Iceland closest to gender equality, but still fighting

2011-11-12T21:22:00.000-08:00

Iceland is known as the most feminist country in the world.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/03/iceland-best-country-women-feminist

...that the country is, in fact, the closest the world has to a feminist paradise. For the last two years it has topped the World Economic Forum's report on equality between the sexes, and last month Newsweek named it the best place in the world for women. The Newsweek survey looked at health, education, economics, politics and justice, and found that in all areas, and the last one in particular, Iceland is about as good as it gets. The prime minister, Jóhanna Sigurdardóttir, tells me via email that she's proud of the survey's outcome, "and not only for women, [but because] we know that gender equality is one of the best indicators for the overall quality of societies."
...

In its two and a half years in power, the government – a coalition of social democrats and left-greens – has been impressively active. It has criminalised the purchase of sex, introduced an action plan on the trafficking of women, and banned all strip clubs. When it comes to domestic violence, Katrin tells me, they have moved towards "the Austrian way", in which whoever committed the violence has to leave the home, rather than the victim going to a refuge. They have also introduced a law to take force in 2013, obliging corporations to have at least 40% of each gender on their boards.

Iceland has a history of progressive female politicians. Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, the country's president from 1980 to 1996, was the world's first democratically elected female head of state. At the time of her initial victory, the number of female politicians in the country was very low – just 5% of MPs – and so in 1983 the Women's Alliance was formed, an explicitly feminist party, which at its highest point, in 1987, held six seats, out of a total of 63. They fought for better wages for women, and, says Thorunn, who was a member, "spent the 1980s talking about all the taboos – rape, incest, domestic violence, putting in place legislation to protect women and children. All those issues are mainstream now, but it took a lot of courage."

...

Jóhanna is the world's first openly gay prime minister, while Vigdís, who seems universally beloved, was famously a single mother. Single motherhood isn't unusual in politics here; Katrin had her first child at 23, and raised him alone for 11 years, while building an impressive career. Parents here talk strongly of community support, of collective care for children, and there is no sense that motherhood precludes work or study, which effectively changes the whole structure of women's lives. "You are not forced to organise your life in the 'college-work-maybe children later' way," says Thorunn, who is a single mother to a young daughter. Andrea says when she had her first child, on her own, at 19, she took him with her to school, "and the teacher would hold him while I was studying".

Joanna Dominiczak, a teacher and chair of the Women of Multicultural Ethnicity Network, says that "having a child here is seen as a gift. You don't have to think, Oh my God, am I going to be able to afford one, two, or three?" The country has progressive rights regarding parental leave after a child is born, with "the mother having three months, which is untransferable," says Joanna, "the father having the same, and then the parents having three months they can share." This sets up the importance of both parents from the start, and skewers the discrimination endemic in many societies, including the UK, where women of child-bearing age are less likely to get jobs for fear they might at some point need maternity leave. (If companies chose to discriminate against both men and women of child-bearing age it would rule out most of the workforce.)

Sigrídur, Eva and Andrea are all single mothers, and while they have some grumbles, all are positive about the nurseries and schools their children attend. Annadís Rudolfsdóttir, studies director of the gender equality studies and training programme hosted by the University of Iceland, lived in the UK until recently, and says it's much easier to be a mother in Iceland. "It costs a fortune to put your children in a nursery in the UK," she says, "but here, as a single mother in Reykjavik, with your child in a nursery eight hours a day, you pay about £70 a month … If you're part of a couple, married or co-habiting, it's about £118 a month. You can imagine how much easier it is when you've got those facilities behind you." That includes breakfast and lunch. (It was recently reported that 32,000 women left their jobs in the UK last year, in large part due to the rising cost of childcare.)

But there are still issues they are working on, for example, sexual violence.

Clearly, we in Australia could do much better. Lets look to Iceland for inspiration.

Motherhugger at 10000 views, and other statistics

2011-11-12T03:21:00.000-08:00

So excited. My blog has received 10000 views. Thanks to everyone who reads my blog.

My most popular posts are Other Words for Sexy and Hot, Music for Kids to Dance to, and Feminism Now: A Snapshot.

My readers are mostly from Australia, US, UK, Russia, Canada and Germany.

In honour of the occasion, I’m sharing some other statistics.

Lets see how the world is tracking.

Have a look here for a whole lot of interesting numbers about worldwide issues.
http://www.worldometers.info/

And here, to see how you place amongst the world’s population.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-15391515

I should add, that while I’m excited that my blog has received 10000 views, my partner’s website has received over 3 million hits. His website has spawned a book, a dvd and a stage musical.

http://www.glasgowapollo.com/

Something for my humble blog to aspire to...

Mamapalooza coming to Sydney

2011-11-10T02:36:00.000-08:00

http://mamapalooza.com/mamablogger365-mamapalooza-takes-sydney.html

This is so exciting!

At the Tap Gallery 7 - 13 May 2012. Musicians, magicians, poets, singer-songwriters, visual and performance artists and commediennes will grace the Sydney stage in May 2012, and create herstory!

I'll be getting involved (just don't know how yet).

Clancy's questions

2011-11-08T17:44:00.000-08:00

A few mornings a week Clancy needs to be at school at 7.20, so we get up before everyone else and have breakfast together. Quietly. Although I don't like getting up early, I do enjoy our time together. It is a time in which she asks me questions. Before 7am. Before I've had my first cup of tea. They're interesting questions, and I can't always answer them straight away, especially first thing in the morning, but I do enjoy that this quiet time together lets me get to know her better and how her mind works. Here are some of her questions. (She's nine years old.)

Who invented kissing and decided that it means love?

Why were the suffragettes called suffragettes?

What is middle class?

What are gypsies?

What’s the nicest thing anyone has done for you?

How did we find out that dogs are colourblind?

Why doesn’t a virus dilute every time it is passed on?

Why is the Statue of Liberty there and what does it mean?
.
If the cycle of the world is working properly, why do we make more money at the mint?

What would your last words be?

I'm thinking I have a thinker on my hands.

Occupy Wallstreet on Broadway

2011-11-07T02:10:00.000-08:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/theater/willy-loman-broadway-and-occupy-wall-street.html?pagewanted=2

Now for me, this is what theatre is for.

An article from the NY Times on theatre inspired by Occupy Wallstreet/ We are the 99% movement. Some revivals, some new. All good.

I feel like I'm on holidays

2011-11-06T18:52:00.000-08:00

This week is such a contrast to last week, I feel like I’m on holiday.

I’ve handed in my last uni assignment, and Banjo has had her operation. I can rest.

I’ll post some info from my studies (social class and education is so interesting) after I get my assignment back (I wouldn’t want my blog to come up on my plagiarism check!) I put out a call on FB for someone to edit my last essay the day before it was due, and my call was answered. Thankyou my nerdy friend, and Mark Zuckerberg.

And, the operation. We spent a day and night in hospital. She had her tonsils and adenoids removed, and inside her nose shaved, and grommets inserted. She has been snoring for years, has a high palate, and this year had a few bouts of tonsillitis. Her hearing was poor. The surgeon said the gunk inside her ear was like green snot. We had to pay everyone before we went to hospital, and that was stressful. We received all the paperwork late. When Cyberguy rang the hospital to organise the payment, they were about to hang up when he was asked if there was anything else she could help with and he said, 'you could make it less'. She said, 'I'll call you back'. Then she rang back with a discounted price. Who knew such things were possible? Means a lot to us. Good to know. You can ask for a discount.

Everything went fine. I’ve learned a lot about Banjo this week. I’ve learnt she plays spotto when looking out her hospital bed window when recovering from an operation. I’ve learnt she can talk on the phone just after her operation. She told her sisters, who she was away from for one night, that she looked different because her hair had grown. I learnt she can now hear better than I can. Instead of her saying pardon, pardon, pardon and us shouting at her, she is telling us to talk quietly. I learnt she likes to administer her own medicine. I’m proud of her. A star patient.

I’ve stayed overnight in hospitals before. Sleeping on the fold out chair beside my daughters’ beds in public hospitals. It’s something of a parental rite of passage. Rotor virus I was there for three nights. Tonsils. Fractured elbow. Tonsils again. This time we went private. I took The Guardian Weekly to read and it didn’t let me down. The camp bed was far from comfortable. The food for me was better. In the public system parents have to fend for themselves. But the nurses didn’t come any sooner when called.

Because when Matilda got her tonsils out she didn’t talk for the first week I was planning on two weeks cooking chicken soup and watching The Flying Nun, but Banjo has other ideas. I’d lined up some neighbours to watch her while I drove the other kids around, but that won’t be necessary - she’s up and about.

I’ve got an awful lot of cleaning to do. My plan is to not make a list for at least a week. That’s a holiday. Time and space and no deadlines.

But the space has quickly been taken up, as it does. There was a knock at the door yesterday. A young Muslim woman taking a survey. I said yes and asked her in. I answered the questions and agreed to fill in two booklets this week. One is a media survey - I mark off everything I watch on tv and listen to on the radio and where I notice advertisements The other is about consumption and attitudes. I’m skipping pages because I don’t buy much. Well, not much that’s new. I don’t ask my friends’ advice about lingerie or jewellery or kitchen appliances. (My friends are talking about politics and kids and menopause.) I don’t support a sporting team or drink alcohol. I don’t like advertising. The most challenging question is naming three people in the public eye I admire. I need to think about that. Any suggestions??

The young Muslim woman is overqualified for the job she’s doing but she couldn’t get experience in her field after doing her degree. She told me she’s interested in acting, but was worried that no-one would be interested in her because of what she wears. I told her we need to see more Muslim women on tv, and in our stories, and she has the just as much right to pursue her interests and talents as anyone else. I hope she goes for it. I’m looking forward to talking to her again when she picks up the survey.

In the meantime I'm being heard, ticking boxes and delivering a commentary like Harold's mum filling in his dating service form in Harold and Maude. It keeps me amused.

Sarah Watt dies

2011-11-05T19:42:00.000-07:00

Sad news today that Sarah Watt, artist, writer and film maker, has died of cancer.

She leaves husband William McInnes, and two children.

You may have seen her films, Look both Ways and My Year Without Sex.

I appreciate her work. And her combining motherhood with her creative life and work.

She is interviewed in Rachel Power's book The Divided Heart: Art and Motherhood. Her tribute here:

http://rachel-power.blogspot.com/2011/11/vale-sarah-watt.html

Sarah Watt's last interview is here

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/when-im-gone--20111021-1mbxg.html

The male/female work/life divide

2011-11-01T18:48:00.000-07:00

Great post today from News With Nipples comparing expectations of work/life balance between men and women.

Men + work + family = completely normal.

Women + work + family = wanting to "have it all". Followed by "probably selfish".

Have a read.

http://newswithnipples.com/2011/11/02/whats-the-difference

And good links too.

An obscence gesture in the classroom and resources for White Ribbon Day

2011-10-29T22:59:00.000-07:00

Some teachers at our school are putting together a program for White Ribbon Day, the campaign to stop violence against women, which happens on Nov 25th. I offered to write a brochure to help parents and teachers choose media for their children, including the findings from the Growing Up Fast and Furious Conference I attended, and other sites, blogs, resources and gender issues that I talk about here on my blog. I have lots of feminist stuff but I'm lacking some info for boys.

The other day I was helping with reading in my daughter's Year 1 class,. We were reading in a small group, and one of the boys put his fingers under his mouth, like a V, and stuck his tongue out. He did that at me. I was a little shocked. I asked him what he was doing. A small girl in the group asked if he was cutting off his tongue. I directed our attention back to our books. The incident bothered me all day, so at school pick up I told the teacher.

This boy is seven years old. I know his mum. They are a nice family. They are a church family. He has older siblings, but they are at primary school. I'm hoping he was just trying to show off, and didn't know what it means. I have no idea how a seven year old boy has picked up the obscene gesture for cunnilingus.

Perhaps it is a glimpse of what I can expect teaching at high school.

So, I'm asking. If you have any resources for boys, let me know, and I'll add it to the brochure.

And if you are interested in seeing the brochure as it is so far, about encouraging respectful relationships, let me know and I'll email you the document.

Costumes for women

2011-10-27T16:11:00.000-07:00

I'm not getting into the whole Halloween is unAustralian/pagan ritual/wrong hemisphere debate. I'm not into Halloween. My kids won't be trick or treating. However, the school does have a Halloween Disco. It's a Halloween Disco because our school calender is so full, when we found a date for a school disco, it happened to be near the date for Halloween, so it became a dress up disco. Fun for young and old. Cyberguy does the music, which is fun for him (and the only volunteering he does for the school).

The point of the post is to share a celebration of women. There is a company that sells costumes for women celebrating famous women in history. Scientists, Queens, Goddesses, from all over the world. I'm not suggesting you buy any of these costumes, but you could use them as inspiration to make your own costumes. Really, I'm just happy to celebrate amazing women in history. The business was created in reaction to the sexification of Halloween costumes (well, the Playboy Bunny version of sexy, that seems to be common in Halloween costumes). Have a look.

http://takebackhalloween.org/

Museum of Motherhood, Mamapalooza and a course

2011-10-24T16:05:00.000-07:00

I'm loving learning about The Museum of Motherhood in New York - photography, artwork, interactive exhibits, theatre works, and academic work. They have exhibitions in a child friendly space. You can drop in for playgroups and storytime. Sounds fantastic. And now, an online course. Have a look.

http://www.mommuseum.org/find-your-m-spot/

Wouldn't it be great to make a similar space in Australia!

Issues in old movies

2011-10-21T02:13:00.000-07:00

I was raised on Bill Collins Golden Years of Hollywood. So I love watching the old films on ABC2 on a Saturday night. Two I’ve seen recently have made me think about social issues: Kramer Vs Kramer, and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.

Which movie seems outdated now?

Kramer vs Kramer was made in 1979. It stars Dustin Hoffman as Ted, and Meryl Streep as Joanna, a married couple who have one son, Billy, aged 5. The film opens with Joanna leaving the family home. Ted has no experience of caring for his son, nor of running a household. The film shows his struggles. It also shows his career slide as care work interferes with his working life. Joanna returns, wanting custody, and explains she felt she needed to work but Ted never listened to her. She felt being a SAHM was crippling her sense of self. She needed to get away, have therapy, get a job, but she never stopped loving her boy. They go to court, and hurt each other in ways they don’t intend. Ted asks why can’t a man be as good a parent as a woman? Joanna win custody, but decides to leave Billy with his father, as he is already home there.

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner was released in 1969. It is about the problems of a prospective interracial marriage. The prospective groom is Sidney Portier playing a doctor - who could object to him? But, at the time, interracial marriage was illegal some states of the USA. Hard to believe now. Interracial relationships don’t turn a hair now. I live in the one of most multicultural municipalities of Australia. I can’t imagine anyone questioning interracial relationships. It feels strange to even say the words. My children watched this movie one afternoon and I had to explain that people used to consider interracial marriage a problem. They couldn't see why.

So, we’ve come a long way on one issue, but not on the other. My children would recognise the issues in Kramer vs Kramer.

This letter was on the SMH site recently.

THANK you (name) and (name) (Working women owed a break, September 25). It is about time we had some serious public debate on the genuine feasibility of female participation in corporate Australia and the need for our government to extend more than just platitudes to help solve the problem. As a mother of two pre-school children, I recently returned from a seven-year stint in Canada, taking up a full-time management position in the financial sector.
Putting aside the free obstetrics and paid maternity leave that met my introduction to the world of motherhood in Canada, childcare was a breeze. Canada encourages migration of caregivers under a scheme whereby they are employed as live-in nannies or elder-care nurses for a specified period of time, after which they may apply for permanent residency. Employers of live-in caregivers receive a significant tax credit which is not means-tested. Is it any wonder that few (if any) of my female colleagues care to join me in this ridiculous working-mother juggling act?
As long as the Australian corporate culture expects ever-increasing hours, our childcare centres continue to close at 6pm and our government fails to support flexible, in-home care options, there will continue to be a dearth of female role models to inspire and mentor the next generation of working mothers.

name Sydney letter SMH site 9.10.11

So, another ten years, perhaps, until this is sorted? I'm hoping my grandchildren will be able to watch Kramer vs Kramer and not understand how the care work of parenting was ever in conflict with being in paid employment.

Child Sacrifice in Uganda

2011-10-20T03:47:00.001-07:00

Some very disturbing things going on in Africa.

I can't argue that children have been sacrificed in a lot of cultures throughout history, so perhaps it is on a spectrum of normal human behaviour. It is unimaginable how anyone could think this is OK.

Albinos are being murdered and their remains sold to witch doctors in Tanzania. Children are being murdered for ritual sacrifice in Uganda. People who go to witch doctors there believe that sacrificing a child will bring them prosperity or protect their wealth. About 900 children have been sacrificed. Numbers have increased over the last three years as Uganda has become more prosperous.

The Jubilee Campaign, an organisation operating out of the UK, is asking that people support their work by signing their petition, or donating money. They also work to free children from prison, and remove children from brothels. Just heartbreaking.

Have a look at the Jubilee Campaign.

http://www.jubileecampaign.co.uk/uganda-campaign

Louis Theroux: A Place for Paedophiles

2011-10-19T17:40:00.000-07:00

In my teacher training we have a textbook about student behaviour in which we are told some aspects of child sexual abuse. How to recognise it and what supports are available and so on. It also lists statistics which shocked me. The incidence is higher than I expected. My textbook says that adult abusers molest about 150 times before being detected. That about 20% of men and 7% of women report having some sexual interest in children. 7% of males and 3% of women would act on this interest if they believe they wouldn’t get caught. Most abusers are known to their victims. Between 20 and 50% of offences are committed by adolescents, half of which is sibling incest. Most abusers were not abused themselves. Basically, we are being told that we will be teaching children who are being, or have been, sexually abused.

I watched Louis Theroux’s documentary last night. It is about the inmates of a Californian psychiatric hospital for convicted paedophiles and rapists. The men are kept there after they have served their prison sentence. Only 30% are involved in the rehabilitation program. The rest are appealing through legal channels, or just being kept there until they die.

A graduate of the rehabilitation program had authorities looking for a place for him to live in the community. So far, 1100 prospective landlords or communities had rejected him. This man had been castrated, at his own request. Only 13 inmates had graduated out of the hospital and into the community.

It was hard to watch. The men seemed very normal. For some, decades had passed since their crimes. For others, there were many more victims of their crimes than the legal system was aware of. One man said he had about 50 victims. Some acknowledged the damage they had done.

As well as group therapy and working with social workers, the men in the program are subjected to lie detector tests and a test where their physical reaction to various types of visual stimulus is recorded. An implement is attached to the penis to measure this reaction. The stimulus can be adult sexual material, or material that suggests children are sexual. They can’t use child pornography, so, the clinicians said, they use pictures of children in bathing suits playing with water or eating fruit. Playing with water or eating fruit. I admit I didn’t see the actual photos, and didn’t see how suggestively children were playing with water or eating fruit. But really. Water and fruit? Whether a response would be recorded by showing child beauty pageants or children in skimpy costumes bumping and grinding at the local dance school concert or children in French Vogue, I don't know.

The whole discussion leads me to lots of questions.

Images of children in advertising, and in our culture generally. The pornification of our culture. We can’t pretend it is harmless. What are the messages that people are receiving that encourage sexual abuse, and that don’t encourage respect for women, girls and boys as whole people who have a right to be safe? I think we already know the answer to that one.

Empowering kids. We need to train kids to stand up for themselves. To speak out and be confident. Which leads to the issue of connection. It is more likely that kids who lack a strong social network are the kids targeted by opportunistic abusers and paedophiles. Isolated kids are at risk kids.

The question of justice. I understand that these men are not welcome in the community. But are their rights being violated? After serving their prison sentences, should they be returned to the community? Perpetrators of other crimes - murderers, embezzlers, armed robbers - are returned to the community. These men are being held on the basis that they might re-offend. Other types of criminals are not treated the same way. Or is holding these men indefinitely sending a clear message to potential offenders that their crime will cost them their futures?

This is a shocking question, but I have to ask it. In Ancient Greece, men had sex with adolescent boys. It was considered normal. And we know that children are trafficked into the sex trade all over the world. Are there any cultures in which child sexual abuse hasn’t happened? If not, then we have to ask if adult sexual interest in children is part of a range of normality, as abhorrent as that idea may be. Is child sexual abuse something we can prevent with education and laws and respect and kindness? Or will there always be people who have the urge and take their opportunities, and the best we can do is try to keep children, not just our children, but all children, out of their way? If there are or have been cultures in which adult sexual interest in children didn't exist, keeping in mind that in some cultures childhood ended earlier than our current age of consent, what was it about those cultures that may have contributed to the sexual safety of children, and what can we learn from them?

Facebook Rape Pages - Petition

2011-10-17T17:11:00.000-07:00

You may have heard about rape culture pages on Facebook.These are pages where people make jokes about rape, and generally, promote rape culture. The story is here:

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/facebook-refuses-to-shut-rape-page-run-by-schoolboy-20111017-1lsde.html

If you want to protest, a petition can be found here:

http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/petition-facebook-to-remove-material-that-promotes-rape.html

A big week in politics

2011-10-13T20:33:00.000-07:00

Two of the major issues in Australian politics are now settled. We have a carbon tax. Asylum seekers will be processed onshore. Done and dusted.

So, what are we going to talk about now?

Q&A can't run programs only talking about gay marriage.

What are the issues you hope will come to the fore of public discussion now that the issues of the carbon tax and accepting asylum seekers are put to rest?

(I'll have a think too. I'm up to my elbows in assignments, but have been pretending I'm not - proofed a friend's thesis, applied to teach ethics in schools, working on a cookbook for school, wrote out a document of resources to support the White Ribbon Day program at school, compiled from info on my blog, more volunteering than you can shake a stick at - but now, back to the assignments...)

Resource for choosing music for kids - Common Sense Media

2011-10-08T03:48:00.001-07:00

I've updated one of my most popular posts, Music for Kids to Dance to, because I've found this great resource that helps you choose not only music, but films, games and books. The site provides brief reviews of books, cds, songs, and electronic media. You can search by age or genre. The film reviews also suggests issues that you might want to discuss with your child. You can find out which Glee cds have the more adult content, and which are OK for tweens. You can find apps that are made for toddlers. And you can browse through lists of old films that you'd forgotten about, but would love to share with your children.

I especially like the Hidden Gems.

Enjoy. (And avoid the oops of buying the Bruno Mars cd for 7 year old.)

http://www.commonsensemedia.org/

Also, the Australian site that reviews films so you Know Before You Go

http://www.youngmedia.org.au/mediachildren/07_04_choose_films.htm

MIRCI seeks support

2011-10-08T01:46:00.001-07:00

Every who knows me in RL knows I'm always banging on about MIRCI (Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement, previously known as ARM - Association for Research on Mothering) which was started and is run by the fabulous Andrea O'Reilly. Andrea circulated an email this week to let people know what is happening with the organisation, and that she needs some help. If you have been thinking about buying some journals or other publications from Demeter Press, now would be a good time to do it. (Before our dollar drops any lower.) Here is the email.

I am emailing concerning MIRCI; some great news and some difficult challenges.

As you no doubt are aware, we have moved to publishing 6-8 Demeter titles a year so we can qualify for some significant funding through the Canadian Government (Cdn Council and Heritage Canada). As a result we had to publish 4 titles this fall to qualify for the grants (Cdn Council nov 1 deadline and Heritage Canada april 1 2012)

The good news is that these are not like sshcc grants: once you meet the eligibility requirements and do the hard work of submitting the application (full financial information, sales reports etc) you receive the grant and it is renewed annually as long as you continue to meet the requirements. We are talking serious money: (10,000-25,000 per year for Cdn Council and 20,000 plus for Heritage Canada). Once we receive these grants, Demeter Press' future will be secure, particularly as we now have a distributor that will also bring in increased sales.

The good news is that we have just learned yesterday that our assessment for Cdn Council grant has been approved and we will be submitting the grant in November (this was a huge hurdle to get over).

The challenging news is that we need to have these four titles published this fall for this grant (and to apply for the even bigger Heritage Canada grant in April). The cost of publishing these 4 titles is more than $30,000 and this must be paid over the next 3 months.Some of this money will be raised through book sales but we still have to raise a lot of money fast to cover these printing costs so we are eligible for these grants: if we don't we can not apply. So we are truly behind a rock and hard place.

I am spending the next few days emailing the loyal supporters of MIRCI/Demeter press in the hope that they can do one or more of the following to raise the needed money so we can publish these titles and secure this grant funding: renew your 2012 membership NOW (form will be on site by end of the week) ideally as a sustaining member, purchase Demeter titles for yourself, a friend or colleagues or make a donation to MIRCI or Demeter Press. Again, the money needs to be raised as soon as possible so we can keep moving these Fall titles into production.

If most of our loyal members did just one of the above we would have the needed money to get these books printed and thus secure these grants to make possible a secure future for Demeter Press..so we can keep doing the important and necessary work of publishing high quality motherhood scholarship.

I do hope that you can.

Thanks

Andrea

Here is the link

http://www.motherhoodinitiative.org/

October is Buy Nothing New Month

2011-10-06T00:19:00.001-07:00

As you know, we shop second hand here at Motherhugger Manor. We recently bought a second hand toaster and microwave. I'd rather not buy new if we can avoid it.

If you want to be part of the movement to avoid buying new, by way of helping the earth and your own budget, have a look at the Buy Nothing New site.

http://buynothingnew.com.au/http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

The idea is to get people thinking. Do you really need it? Where does it come from? Where does it go? Can you borrow or swap or buy second hand instead?

There seems to be more of a vintage/op-shop culture in Victoria. They have Savers Recycle Superstores that we don't have in NSW. Brotherhood Books are selling books online with free postage. In Victoria they have stylists visit Brotherhood of St Laurence Hunter Gather stores. That's very cool. I'd love that job!

Playboy at Diva

2011-10-02T05:13:00.000-07:00

http://www.diva.net.au/#/shop/ranges/playboy/1http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

The jewellery store, Diva, has a new range of Playboy jewellery. Have a look. For many girls, this kind of shop is their first foray into buying jewellery. Diva knows that selling Playboy merchandise offends some people, but, according to the message at the bottom of their homepage, they don't care.

If you think it is wrong to market porn industry products to young girls, here's what you can do.

Write to Diva here: contact@diva.net.au

You can let them know what you think on their Facebook page.

Phone them: 02 9938 3311 or 1300 348 228http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

Collective Shout has a petition you can sign.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

http://collectiveshout.org/2011/09/diva-selling-playboy-brand-to-girls/

Or read the post here

http://empowering-girls.blogspot.com/2011/10/sluts-playboy-bunnies-and-little-girls.html

The time warp

2011-10-02T04:03:00.000-07:00

This year, has been a strange kind of time warp
At the end of term 1 I felt as if the year was done.
At the end of term 3 I felt as if the term had just begun.
We’ve spent the year lurching from one annual event to the next, interrupted by children’s illnesses. Regularly. Too regularly.

Remember how last holidays I said we were resting, because everyone had been sick, and we wanted to keep the sicknesses at bay? Well, it didn’t work.

This term the children have had four bouts of tonsillitis, we’ve had vomiting, diarrhoea and high temperatures. Banjo fractured both her wrists. She fell off the monkey bars at school. She had one purple cast and one red, which she used to colour co-ordinate her outfits. Matilda fell on her arm but it wasn’t fractured. On the way to the ENT specialist the other day, Banjo vomited on the train. Lovely. She needs to have her tonsils and adenoids out, her ears drained, grommets inserted and the sides of somewhere inside her nose shaved off. She’ll be off school for two weeks (and we need to rethink Christmas, holidays, and anything that involves money.)

This term I’ve done most of my uni readings in doctor’s waiting rooms and at the hospital.

This term all the children had to write and perform speeches. It’s the bane of every family. Matilda’s was on animal rights and food production. Then she decided she’s giving up red meat. Even kangaroo sausages. Now, her dad is vegetarian, so this wasn’t a big step for us, but even so. There are few enough intersections of what the children will eat. Spag bol was a one. Potato Bake. Vietnamese rolls. Homemade pizza. Carrot sticks. Porridge (our resident Scotsman is handy with a spurtle). Pancakes. Apples. That’s about it.

Then I told the children that, being school holidays and me having a uni assignment due, they were in charge of dinner. And voila. Red meat is back on the menu. Clancy made meatballs and pasta in a tomato sauce, and Matilda made Chicken Teriyaki (of a type).

Now, we really are on the home stretch. All the end of year events are coming up. I wonder if it will feel like the end of the year. I’m looking forward to all our duties being dispensed with and we can just relax. I hope.

Unwatchable - Save the Congo

2011-10-02T03:02:00.000-07:00

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/sep/28/unwatchable-congo-rape-short-film

A viral film campaign by Save the Congo is causing controversy in the UK. The film is called 'Unwatchable'. Based on the principle that western audiences are desensitised to violence and horror, especially the violence in Africa, the film transposes the story of an African girl being raped to a blonde girl in a market town in Glocestershire. The film depicts the vicious gang rape of the girl and the murder of her parents.

The aim of the film, according to Vava Tampa, director of Save the Congo, is the entirely laudable one of raising awareness about the use of conflict minerals mined in the Congo and used in mobile phones. If you manage to get to the end of the film there are storyboards that spell it out. Rape is used as a tactic of war by militias keen to gain control over valuable mineralshttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif such as tungsten, tin and tantalum.

"You have the power," the film intones, "to demand your mobile phone manufacturer stops using blood minerals." It urges us to "find out more, sign the petition, share this film".

I'm not going to link to the film.Instead I'm linking to the film of the women whose story this is based upon. It is as disturbing as anything you could see or read, but it is the truth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYUsMD3BbZg&feature=related

I've written about women in the DRC and about mining minerals for mobile phones before. Some campaigners say that every mobile phone carries a bit of the war in the Congo. I hope that people will protest what is happening there without having to watch graphic violence, whether that violence be perpetrated on English people in fiction, or on African people in reality.

LadyNerd

2011-10-02T02:48:00.000-07:00

Ladynerd is a one woman cabaret by Kiera Daley celebrating smart women. It was presented by Sydney Fringe Festival.

This show is funny. Great singing. Informative. Great LadyNerds celebrated on the night included Marie Curie (research on radioactivity), Hedy Lemarr (Hollywood actress who invented frequency hopping - mobile phones would not work without it), Ada Lovelace (daughter of Lord Byron who wrote the first computer program before computers were made), Bette Nesmith Graham (invented Liquid Paper) and all nerdy women everyone.

Great feminism and great entertainment.

Click
Click
Click
Everytime I click my fingers
Someone
Somewhere
Is putting an apostrophe in the wrong place!

A Dangerous Idea - All Women are Sluts.

2011-10-02T02:00:00.000-07:00

I know I said I wouldn’t be going to The Festival of Dangerous Ideas, but my very kind friend Michelle shouted me to join her at two sessions.

The first one was Sleeping with the Enemy: Collaborating with Corporations by Mike Daisy - about how we are all complicit with the rise and power of inhumane corporations and should be fighting a war of resistance against then by socially shunning anyone who works for one. He also does a monologue about Apple and Steve Jobs and factory workers in China.
He had me from the start when he said we were hypocrites - there will be no dangerous ideas for the comfortable middle classes at our lovely Opera House.

And then there was.

The session, All Women Are Sluts.

The panel consisted of: Clem Bastow, writer, broadcaster and music critic based in Melbourne; Samah Hadid is a young human rights advocate and 2010 Australian Youth Representative to the UN; and Catherine Lumby, author, public commentator and Director of Journalism and Media Research at UNSW.
It was chaired by Ann Mossop.

The members of the panel all agreed with each other. They embraced the word 'Slut’, saying, we’re all sluts now; lets empty the word of its power, lets claim it for ourselves (as minorities have done with the word nigger, or queer or dyke), yet were appalled on hearing a teenage girl in the audience say that girls in her school call each other sluts as a way of bullying each other. So, does the word have power or not?

What is the point of having a panel where everyone agrees? The points raised by people in the audience we more interesting than the panelists’.

Sorry, I will not embrace my ‘sluthood’. I think you are all misguided.

What was not covered was how this may affect children. If the word is embraced as something that is a positive thing for women’s identity, does that mean we are happy for children to call each other sluts? No. No-one told the girl she should say, ‘yes I’m a slut and proud of it.’

Samah Hadid said that a rape victim had told her she had recovered because she can embrace the term slut. It is hard to believe.

I’m as against slut shaming and victim blaming as the next feminist, but embracing the word slut is leading us in the wrong direction. Slutwalk did get a conversation started. It has brought younger women into a feminist protest. But it hasn’t been well thought through.

What about women in developing nations who are forced into the sex trade? Would they be happy to identify as sluts? Does slutwalk help them? I don’t see the UN Women calling for more Slutwalks.

And what was it with bagging Reclaim the Night? It has the same message that women should be able to walk down the street at night wearing whatever they like and not be raped. It is a message to men to not rape. Why is that event now not OK? Is it not considered cool by younger feminists? They want something more edgy?

And what is it with bagging out Gail Dines? There is more to the arguments around porn than ‘porn can be fun’ or ‘feminists make porn’. Raunch culture/porn/slut-shaming/rape culture all intersect.

In the advertisement for the new film, Crazy Stupid Love, a male character says something like. ‘The war of the sexes is over. We won when women started doing poledancing for fitness.’ I feel that slutwalk is like that. It shows we’ve given up. It’s not that we’ve lost. We’ve given it away. Why can’t we protest to be respected, but do it in a way that respects ourselves, our children, and women all over the world as well?

I won’t be campaigning for the right for my children to be called sluts. The word should die from disuse. As should any other word that demeans women - bitch, cunt, strumpet, slag, scrubber etc

Slutwalk runs counter to other feminist work. I hope this year’s event will be the last.

So, I’m asking; can we workshop the ideas a little more please, so that the movement doesn’t damage women or children?

Proud Hoydens Take Back the Night, perhaps? Or Take Back the Fucking Night?

I've sent emails to Clem Bastow and Samah Hadid asking if Slutwalk is helpful to children or women in developing countries.

Histories of Motherhood in Australia Conference

2011-09-28T02:32:00.000-07:00

http://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/events/events_talks/events/Histories_of_Motherhood_in_Australia.hhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giftml

This conference is being held at the NSW State Library on Thursday 29 September 2011.
School holidays here.

Let me know if you go.

Sometimes my children surprise me

2011-09-26T04:21:00.000-07:00

Sometimes my children surprise me. No, this isn’t a story about how capable they are and how they exceed my expectations.

Sometimes the children say things that cause me to exclaim ‘Are you delirious?’ or ‘Are you trying to be ex-communicated from the family?’

Like when Banjo said ‘ I hate books’ or Clancy said ‘I’m sick of the Beatles’ or, today from Matilda, ‘I don’t care about music’.

Who ARE these people, and what are they doing in my house??

Cordelia Fine's article on Porn in The Monthly

2011-09-25T01:15:00.000-07:00

I like Cordelia Fine. I spoke to her at the Growing Up Fast and Furious Conference last year, not knowing she was about to present. I want to read her book Delusions of Gender which is not only well reviewed but considered a book of important ideas. Have a look at her website to see her considerable achievements.

Cordelia Fine wrote the lead article in The Monthly this month. I saw it at the newsagents, and, lucky me, found I could read it for free online, so I'm sharing the link here.

http://www.themonthly.com.au/dehumanising-effects-smut-porn-ultimatum-cordelia-fine-3782

The article describes, explicitly, what happens in porn, so not for the squeamish. She looks at the book Pornland, by Gail Dines and the new anthology edited by Melinda Tankard Reist, Big Porn Inc.

... social norms need to be wrested back from the pornographers, as many contributors to Big Porn Inc are attempting to do, and returned to something more closely aligned with the idea of half the population enjoying as much respect and recognition of their full humanity as the other. It isn’t prudishness that explains why there aren’t endless images of headless men’s bulging crotches on billboards, and prepubescent boys in ‘mankinis’ like little sex objects in training. It’s just … civility. Pornland world-order, in which women exist to titillate men, does not belong in everyday life. In the twenty-first century, Zoo magazine belongs on the front counter of a convenience store about as much as a magazine called Best of Black and White Minstrel Shows.

She ends with a call for a Lysistrata type campaign. Dines says there's no room for porn in a just society. Fine suggests ‘No equality, no porn.’

Interesting.

Christmas gift ideas (or things I like online)

2011-09-25T00:21:00.000-07:00

Three months away, I know, but I like to get a jump on ideas for Christmas presents.

We don’t want to bring a whole lot of new stuff into the house. So we shop carefully. Lots of what we buy is second hand. And we try to give gifts of experience.

So here are the ideas on the boil for Christmas this year.

I’m thinking of giving all the kids (and maybe CyberGuy) an annual pass to Luna Park.

Tickets to see the musical Annie.

Matilda is having some extra dance classes.

I’ve bought Clancy some books and kids cds online (I did this when the Australian dollar starting going down). They’re second hand. She helped choose, and included some Horrible Histories books. (I’m stocking up on kids cds that I’ve bought online as gifts for kids for birthday presents too. Partly because it is hard to buy for other people’s kids - they mostly have everything they could want - and partly because there is a gap in the Australian market for cds for kids. Many more available OS than here, and they’re good - we like them.)

Banjo wants some hair accessories and toys for hairstyling. So, I’ll get her that. She wants some more Fancy Nancy books too.

Here are links to some other things I like. I’m not saying I’m getting all these - just that I like them. (I’ll wait and see how the Australian dollar goes...)

I love looking at ModCloth - the retro styles suit me. It’s the site I take my eyes to for a rest. I've already worn lost of these styles, so it's kind of a nostalgic fashion trip for me. Or I've found these styles in op-shops, so I don't need to buy from the site.

However, I do like this bag. There is also a Great Gatsby bag and t shirt.

http://www.modcloth.com/Modcloth/Womens/Accessories/Bags/-Bookshelf-Bandit-Tote-in-J-D

And I love their swimmers.
http://www.modcloth.com/Modcloth/Womens/Swimwear/-In-a-Daze-y-One-Piece

And this hedgehog doormat
http://www.modcloth.com/Modcloth/Apartment/Furnish+Decorate/-Hedge-Sweet-Hog-Doormat

I like these t shirts with Harry Potter slogans. (I like the ‘Keep Calm and Drink Tea’ one too.)

http://www.redbubble.com/people/loveaj/t-shirts/6822052-i-fight-for-house-elf-rights

http://www.redbubble.com/people/wittytees/art/7464682-keep-calm-and-carry-a-wand

http://www.redbubble.com/people/ig-hateyhate/t-shirts/7437908-harry-potter-polyjuice-shirt

And I like the Luna quotes too.

And I like these instructional dance and exercise videos, Some of them are very affordable (and there are some I’d like for myself or might suggest for the dance program at school.)

http://www.activevideos.com/index.php/instructional-dance/kids-dance-exercise-sports.html

I’ll get CyberGuy some books on rock music, or classic rock t shirts.

I’ll get my sisters some finds from op shops that suit them, or maybe a cd each. I’ll ask what they want.

For myself, I only ever want books or cds. I've kept my list of wants on a very large Amazon Wishlist for the last few years - it documents my interests. I know where to keep books and cds in the house - on shelves. (Although I'm just as happy to use the ones at the library.) Tickets to shows are always nice too. And lovely tea. I never want anything else really.

And Christmas shopping is done. That’s it!

Do you have any good ideas for gifts of experience for Christmas?

Are there any online shops you keep coming back to?

This is the kind of nerd I am

2011-09-23T19:17:00.000-07:00

Nothing to do with feminist mothering. I could draw a long bow, but I'm not going to bother.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/sep/21/madeline-miller-top-10-classical-books

This conversation is making me nostalgic for hanging out with Classicists at university. I wrote my M. Lit thesis on a feminist rewriting of Cassandra. A friend and I created a student journal for Classics students to publish their works. (We had a crush on Ovid and Catullus). I think I've read all the books mentioned in the post and the comments. All the ancient ones. I can't wait until I can share them with my children.

Just for fun - here are my favourites.

Homer - The Iliad and The Odyssey (of course)

Virgil - The Aeneid (the quest, a guided hero, and Dido)

Ovid - everything (he's such a wag)

Catullus - poems (falling in love, being in love, rejected by love)

Petronius - The Satyricon (the anti-hero - more modern than today)

Apuleius - The Golden Ass (circular storytelling, robbers and thieves and a talking donkey)

Euripides - Medea (a wife's revenge), The Women of Troy (the spoils of war), The Bacchae, Iphigenia in Aulis (sacrifice of Agamemnon's daughter)

Appolonius of Rhodes - The Argonautica ( I love Hypsipyle)

Longus - Daphnis and Chloe (like a fairy tale)

Sophocles - Oedipus The King (the first recorded/extant use of dramatic irony), Antigone (she stand up for what she believes in)

Sappho - poetry (the first recorded/surviving use of the word 'bittersweet')

Aristophanes - Lysistrata (women protesting the war)

My favourite rewriting from ancient myth is Kliest's Penthesilea. (She was Queen of the Amazons.)

OK, I wish I had time to write about feminism in ancient classics. But while I'm writing my assignment for my Dip Ed, this has been a nice distraction to keep me keen to teach. So much fun.

Have you read and enjoyed any other these?

In what way are you a nerd?

10 Campaign to stop child labour on cocoa plantations

2011-09-20T19:05:00.000-07:00

Stop the Traffick has joined forces with World Vision and other organisations to campaign against child labour being used on cocoa plantations.

Ten years ago
Ten years ago the global chocolate industry, through its various trade associations, signed the Harkin-Engel Protocol, a 6-point roadmap that was to enable the elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour (WFCL) in the cocoa sector of Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana. However, according to Tulane University, mandated by the US government to report on progress on the Protocol from 2006 to 2011, none of the Protocol’s six articles calling for action were fully implemented, and the required industry-wide reform in the cocoa sector has not taken place. Tulane also documented the systemic nature of the problem: an estimated 1.8 million children are working, some in hazardous labor conditions, in the cocoa sector of Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana.

10 Campaign
Major civil society organisations and trade unions working throughout the world on ethical cocoa (including Stop The Traffik, International Labor Rights Forum, World Vision Australia and many others) have joined the campaign to speak with one voice on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Protocol. Together they call on national and international legislative bodies to implement key legislation to ensure that companies get the task done.

$1.000.000.000.000
From 2001 to 2011, the global revenue from cocoa products was an estimated USD 1 trillion. However, in order for the elimination of these practices to actually come to pass, clear and strong legislation is needed as the status quo is not acceptable: why should children toil, at the expense of their health, education and sometimes their lives, for an industry so immensely profitable?

You can participate here
http://www.10campaign.com/

New Moon Girls Girl-Caught Campaign

2011-09-19T19:50:00.000-07:00

Girls Take a Stand Against Disrespect in the Media

New Moon Girls presents its new Girl-Caught Campaign

09.19.2011– From lingerie for 4-year-olds to “I’m too pretty for math,” T-shirts, girls are bombarded with messages that destroy their self-esteem and self-worth, telling them that they need to be pretty, sexy, and not too smart.

Enough is enough, and New Moon Girls is empowering girls to say, “Stop It!” with the Girl-Caught campaign on Sept. 22, 2011: Day of the Girl to honor this important day.

In the 19 years since New Moon Girls started, sexualization of toys, games, clothes, movies, TV and music marketed to and for under 16-year-olds has increased dramatically. The Girl-Caught campaign site gives girls, boys and adults an empowering way to show and comment on both negative and positive images and messages about girls and women.

New Moon Girls is partnering with Day of the Girl, Mind on the Media, Pigtail Pals, Powered By Girl, School Girls Unite, and Shaping Youth to give girls and others a voice, and spread the word far and wide that we do not have to accept these disrespectful messages anymore, and to increase respect for girls and women in all media.

Make the world better in four easy steps:
1. Go to the Girl-Caught site.
2. Download or print out your own Girl-Caught stickers.
3. Paste them to the negative or positive Girl-Catches you find.
4. Upload them to Girl-Caught!

New Moon Girls is also planning an event in Washington, DC and Congressional offices nationwide to deliver thousands of Girl-Catches to Congress in support of the Healthy Media for Youth Act.

Through Girl-Caught, girls, boys, women, and men can have an impact on the messages girls and women receive from companies and the media today, and shape how they see themselves tomorrow.

http://www.pitchengine.com/newmoongirlmedia/girls-take-a-stand-against-disrespect-in-the-media/174343/

Go girls. And they use pictures from French Vogue as an example of images that are disrespectful to girls. I'm happy for my daughters to be involved in New Moon Girls.

PM baby-wearing

2011-09-18T01:43:00.000-07:00

The day the festival dream died

Baby Björn-swaddled David Cameron meets Jeremy Clarkson at Alex James's cheese festival – could it get any worse?

Say cheese: Alex James looks on as Jeremy Clarkson talks to David Cameron at Harvest. Photograph: PA

Behold, a snapshop from last weekend's Harvest festival organised by Alex James.

This, from The Guardian.

Alex James was the guitarist in Blur, now into cheese, apparently.

I just had to share this pic of the British PM wearing his baby. Check how he is expanding his chest, and doesn't touch the baby, as if he's ignoring the fact he is wearing a baby. But anyhoo, good on him for wearing his baby. Can't recall seeing any Australian male politicians wearing a baby pouch.

Motherhood: The Musical - another chance

2011-09-17T04:23:00.000-07:00

Motherhood: The Musical is back

Oct 13 -15 at the Seymour Centre, if you missed it the first time around.

Recommended.

Education and Social Justice

2011-09-17T04:19:00.000-07:00

All teachers in training in NSW have to cover a unit on social justice. Like me, they are being taught to be conscious of issues such as race, ethnicity and multiculturalism, gender and sexuality, bias in the curriculum, class, the city/country divide, indigenous issues in education, globalisation, ethics and critical thinking.

We are directed to videos such as this one, which challenges what education is all about.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U

I’ve noticed teacher, Phil Beadle, who was named Secondary School Teacher of the Year in the UK in 2004 (before becoming a teacher he was a rock musician). He was shown on a reality tv series called The Unteachables, and now writes and speaks about teaching. Everything he says about how to teach (eg, every child has something to offer, you need to get to know what the kids are interested in and tailor the lesson to their interests etc) is what we are being taught. He is, I think, not the exception, but the standard. At least in NSW education training. And he says he teaches for social justice.

Pretty reassuring, isn’t it. That all teachers are covering education in terms of social justice.
And lots of what we cover can also be applied to issues in motherhood studies. Neat.

Mindy Sotiri - Divorce Songs (really, songs about mothering)

2011-09-15T17:31:00.000-07:00

I attended this cd launch this week. It was great to hear songs about mothering in an Australian accent, and an Australian context. I'm glad it can be considered rock 'n' roll. Well done Mindy.

“When I first heard the sublime Mindy Sotiri sing about baby monitor static at an inner-city pub, I burst into tears and smudged all my eyeliner. Sure at the time I was a hormonal wreck because I, too, was up all night breastfeeding. But words can't express how amazing, re-assuring and downright subversive it was to witness my new maternal existence making an appearance at an actual live music gig. NO-ONE sings about this stuff. And they SHOULD. Because it's huge and it's important and it can make women crazy if they think they're the only ones going through it. Mindy is not just an outrageously talented musician - she's bringing women's intense private worlds into the public (or at least the pub-y) sphere. And that's as rock as it gets” (Emma Tom, 2010)

“Tender, stark and honest” (The Brag, 2010)

Mindy Sotiri is launching her third album Divorce Songs. Released through Laughing Outlaw Records, Divorce Songs is a close-up look at a long term relationship – it’s grand romantic threads (love, infidelity, ambivalence) set up against the domestic love catastrophe of real life: play groups, sleep deprivation, baby monitor static, sore boobs and toddler snot.
Situated somewhere to the east of Ani Difranco and Suzanne Vega, and occasionally channeling the eminent grumpy old men of folk, Mindy Sotiri makes music from the mess of everyday life. Incisive, direct and occasionally hilarious- this is alt-folk at its best; inventive playing, a unique voice, a cracking and versatile band. And tunes that have something to say.

Divorce Songs evolved in the rare quiet spaces of a busy, boring, and occasionally tumultuous domestic life. Retreating to the bathroom (the only room in the house to have the bonuses of both a lock AND sufficient distance from bedrooms to allow for noisy strumming) Mindy wrote songs while perched on the loo, paper, pens and capos balanced on the edge of the bath, pausing to open the door every 3 minutes to check no-one had woken up and started crying. This approach seemed to work. Babies slept a bit, were fed a lot, and over the space of a couple of years tunes for an album were written.

Australia now has a Global Ambassador for Women and Girls

2011-09-14T16:43:00.001-07:00

Penny Williams is the newly appointed Australian Global Ambassador for Women and Girls.

A career diplomat and mother of four from Tasmania, Ms Williams will tackle gender inequality in the Asia Pacific, focus governments' attention on the needs of women after wars and conflict, and ensure Australia's aid dollars are helping to tackle maternal deaths and domestic violence.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/first-ambassador-for-women-calls-on-australia-to-lead-change-20110913-1k7vc.html#ixzz1XsbBAwTK

Good news.

My questions to Q&A for tonight

2011-09-11T17:03:00.000-07:00

I've sent these questions in for tonight's show. I'll let you know if they're shortlisted.

Melinda Tankard Reist

You lobby for respectful images of women in the media. In spite of decades of talking about gender issues, and women’s rights, women and girls are disrespected by images on billboards, and now also on t shirts. A few years ago the NSW Police Commissioner said that women are fundamentally disrespected in our society. What is it going to take to change our culture so that women are fundamentally respected?

Melinda Tankard Reist

At the end of each year we read stories about dance concerts where scantily clad little girls are bumping and grinding. My family was asked to leave our dance school when I suggested that having children dance to songs about sex when they don’t know it is about sex is exploitation. How do we educate dance schools to be more aware of their gendered messages, and to have more respect for children?

Prof Greer

You once said that mothers need a union. Given the aims of the women's movement have not been met - we still don't value care work, we don't equally share domestic work and women are not fairly represented in positions of power - how can we activate mothers for social change?

There is a limit of 80 words for the questions, so you have to keep it snappy. You can submit your questions here:

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/ask-question.htm

Naomi Stadlen, who wrote What Mothers Do, Especially When it Looks Like Nothing, has a new book

2011-09-11T05:22:00.000-07:00

Naomi Stadlen: 'With mothering you can always put things right, make things better' Photograph: Graham Turner for the Guardian

Naomi Stadlen likes mothers. She has written two books with the word in the title: What Mothers Do, Especially When it Looks Like Nothing and her latest one, How Mothers Love and How Relationships are Born. She has for 20 years run weekly Mothers Talking meetings, at which she chats with mothers about the sort of week they have had, spring-boarding various discussions. She is a mother of three and a grandmother of two. I don't think to ask how old she is as it doesn't seem to matter; she is in the "wise" category. She's an existential psychotherapist, so I know she is careful with words because she understands the weight they carry. Her answer to the question "Why are you obsessed with mothers?" is unexpected. "I come from a line of problematic mothers." Oh....

"For too long, mothers have let other people dominate the way motherhood is framed and seen and now, for the first time, there is a much bigger generation of mothers who are educated to question all these things that have been said about them. But they don't. You have these people say to you, 'I'd rather be nice to my baby than not, but the books tell me I'm not a firm enough mother.'"

Whereas what mothers do is actually more scientific – and less anecdotal – than they realise...

"Everyone says 'parenting' these days," she gently chides, as I tell her an anecdote about a mother, but use the word parenting. "What's wrong with the word mothering?"

From here http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/sep/10/mothering-parents-naomi-stadlen-psychotherapist

Reading aloud to your child

2011-09-11T05:11:00.000-07:00

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/sep/10/alice-ozma-dad-read-every-night

A book written by 23 year old Alice Ozma about her dad reading to her ever night from the ages 9 -to 18, when she left home. Only Alice and her dad lived in the family home and the fact of reading together gave them a connection, and a language they could share. It's a lovely story.

Reminds me to turn off the tv, and get back to reading nightly to the kids.

Missrepresentation - a film about how women are portrayed in the media

2011-09-10T22:37:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Joan for sharing this. A trailor for a new film from the US called Missrepresentation about how powerful women are portrayed in the media, and how this impacts on young people. Have a look.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2UZZV3xU6Q&feature=related

Whatever the media do badly, they could do well. Time for a change.

There is also a website where people who support the ideas in the film are asked to take action by speaking out about demeaning representations of women and girls.

http://www.missrepresentation.org/home.html

Part of what I've done to encourage change is supporting New Moon Girls. This is a feminist magazine for girls that exists online and in hardcopy that is created by and for girls. My eleven year old daughter has a subscription and enjoys participating in the site, including safe online chat. It is run from the US by mums who became the change they wanted to see.

http://www.newmoon.com/

More women onto Boards - a good move.

2011-09-07T16:43:00.000-07:00

Just how business would channel the 55 per cent of university graduates who were women into career pathways to the senior executive ranks, and boards, demanded a cultural shift.

''We talk a lot about female role models, and they are very important,'' Ms Hewson said.

''But the real key to this would be male role models working flexible hours, taking their share of leaving early to pick up the children two days a week. A male role model at the chief executive or chairman level is incredibly powerful...''

ONE OF Australia's most powerful female company directors, Carolyn Hewson, has a message. If women are to participate fully in corporate life, Australia must embrace the nanny culture.

''We do not have a nanny culture in this country, and it severely hampers us - and I speak here from personal and desperate experience,'' the former investment banker told the Women in Banking and Finance forum.

''In Asia, and in Europe, there's a much more appropriate nanny culture,'' she said.

Getting more women onto boards is a move in the right direction, for a lot of reasons. And it looks like it is happening.

The boardroom blitz was an election commitment of the government. It set a target that by 2015, boards were to have no more than 60 per cent of either gender. In June last year, women comprised 34.5 per cent of members of all government boards...

The increasing demand for female board members has been driven by the Australian Securities Exchange's new gender diversity policy.

The Australian Institute of Company Directors recently reported that this year, women accounted for nearly 30 per cent of new board appointments in ASX 200 companies - a 600 per cent increase on 2009 when they accounted for 7.5 per cent of appointments.

Setting targets. Male executives being seen as parents with care responsibilities. Nannies. We're ready. Lets go.

Send a question to Q&A

2011-09-06T16:18:00.000-07:00

Next Monday night both Germaine Greer and Melinda Tankard Reist are on the panel for Q&A. That's exciting. I've been in the audience when Germaine Greer has appeared on the show before. The producers liked a question I submitted and paid for my cab fare so I could attend. I didn't get to ask my question in the end, but I really enjoyed being there.

With two active feminists on the show, this is a good opportunity to submit a question. Send a question you really want to know the answer to, or send a question to draw attention to your burning issue. A good opportunity to talk about mothering and feminism, protecting children, social policy or work/life balance.

You might want to ask something about the issues Melinda Tankard Reist works with on Collective Shout.

http://collectiveshout.org/

The link to the ABC website is here:

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/

I'll see what I can come up with and submit a few questions. I'm looking forward to watching next week's show.

Dancing to the wrong song - here we go again!

2011-09-05T17:41:00.000-07:00

The dance groups at our school are pretty popular. We’re lucky that we have the teachers who are prepared to teach these groups in their own time, and that they are so well supported. We are even having a special dance showcase night where the dance groups will perform and individual dancers can perform solos or their own performance pieces in small groups (Matilda is doing a ballet solo to Sleeping Beauty).

However, there is still a problem with the choices of the male teacher who takes the senior boys dance group. He has been teaching the boys a dance to Sweat, by Snoop Dogg and David Guetta. The dance includes an appearance by a young girl. The whole idea is just wrong wrong wrong. The teacher has been told by the head of the dance program to change the song, but the problem remains that the teacher thought it was ok. He originally wanted to use an Eminem song, but edit out some lyrics. Still wrong.

I know someone who works for the Dep’t of Ed Arts Unit, who says that if a group wants to perform at a State performance, they must submit the lyrics to the song. This song would not pass. Some schools run the lyrics by the Principal before beginning work on the dance. I think this is what we need to organise.

But the point I want to write across the sky is this: if the children think the song is about one thing, but the audience knows it is about sex, that is exploitation. That isn’t respectful. That isn’t ok. And I’m not prepared to let that happen.

I need to have a chat with the dance teacher, or ask that the head of the program or the Principal explain why choosing to dance to songs about sex (and the stereotyped depictions of gender, power, and relationships), and have children perform those dances in public, is wrong. But I also need to approach this carefully. Wish me luck.

Fashion Faux Pas

2011-09-04T17:32:00.000-07:00

About ten years ago I saw a colour and style consultant. It means I know what colours suit me (deep jewel colours and icy tones), and what styles (scoop neck over v neck, sweetheart neckline best). It means I can swoop into an opshop and quickly identify any decent options by colour, feel of fabric (fabric must breathe), style and size. For many clothing shops I know there is no point entering because there is nothing inside for me. It was a good investment; one I wish I had made earlier.

Last week, feeling that spring has sprung, I was looking for my pink shoes with the flowers on them. I bought them about two years ago and had never worn them, but decided this was the day. I couldn’t find them. I must have given them away, in the cold of winter, feeling that, being mid-forties, I’m too old to wear cute clothes and pink flowered shoes.

I want those shoes back!

My fashion faux pas these days is giving away clothes then later regretting it. I regret giving away the long dress I made. After having three kids it would have fit well with a good bra and a pair of spanx. Why didn’t I think of that? I now have no garments that I have made in my wardrobe. I’ve given them all away. I regret giving away the blue polka dot dress. And the steel blue tencel pants. And the yellow mini-cardi that tied up under the bust, Regency style. So cute. I regret giving away my grandmother’s dress. I’ve never again seen a dress cut like that. And my mothers’ Fletcher Jones skirts I gave to a French exchange student. What was I thinking? I gave away the clothes that weren’t practical to wear while breastfeeding, or cooking with toddlers underfoot. How short-sighted of me. No long dresses or flared long sleeves in my wardrobe anymore.

I wish I had time to style each day. My fashion sense as a teenager and young adult was ‘theatrical’. I went to fashion school. I made my own clothes at a time when it was cheaper to do so. Now clothes are so cheap, there isn’t much point. Clothes at an opshop could cost more than new, but they’re more interesting, and, for me, buying from a charity shop is more ethical. When the children were younger I was in danger of my main fashion influence being Hi-5. Now, my main fashion influence is Lionel Shriver, because, she says, she wears the same thing for a week. That’s what I do. The truth is, I don’t have time for anything else. Every day I wear a bag that crosses my upper body, so my hands are free when we’re out and about. It’s very practical. Not very fashionable.

I care about fashion. Not high fashion but day to day wearable fashion. I just look like I don’t. But I don't want to look like I've given up (a reference to my partner's comment when I popped on a big blue poncho). Wearing all black now makes me look like an Italian widow. I'm taking a cue from Cherie, by Collette, where Cherie says softer pinks are kinder when you age. Will I be an eccentric-looking old person, when I have more time to be stylish? Do I have to wait? I don't want to wear tight clothes, or lots of accesories or anything crazy. I don't want to go all Carrie Bradshaw. But can I still wear cute clothes in my mid-forties, or would that be mutton dressed as lamb?

Shamelessly promoting the work of friends

2011-08-31T17:07:00.001-07:00

Yes, this post is shamelessly promoting the work of friends. Simple as that.

Anyone who makes their own work, pursues their ideas and talents, is someone I'm happy to support.

My friend, Paul Barry, an actor who lives in LA, is putting together a project to make a documentary about his finance's grandmother, and her experience in Poland during WWII.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/wisiasstory/wisias-story

My friend, Sophie Ruggles, who now lives in Barcelona, has made a cookbook and blogs about cooking. Her book is the book I needed when I first started feeding my kids, because I was clueless. It's a really good book. We met as teenagers. I remember when she was a single mum with a toddler she made sandwiches to sell to local businesses. She has always had a lot of initiative and drive and creativity.

http://www.suddenlycooking.com/

Joan Garvan is President of the Australian branch of MIRCI (Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement). She recently was awarded her PhD from ANU, and has put together this site of resources re mothering.

http://www.maternalhealthandwellbeing.com/

Heidi Goh has written and illustrated a children’s book called York’s Universe. It is being launched at Better Read Than Dead at Newtown in September.

Rebekka Neville is a jazz singer. We met years ago at jazz workshops. She sings as part of a duo, trio, quartet. She's now also in my babysitting club.

http://rebekkaneville.com.au/

http://www.myspace.com/rebekkaneville

The Jessamine cd launch is happening tonight. I met Jess when she was eleven. My share house was next door to her family home, and the households kind of merged. While at school Jess and her friends formed the band Nitocris. She now fronts her own band, Jessamine (and, yes, that's her real name.)

http://www.liveguide.com.au/Tours/703723/Jessamine/Jessamine_Album_Launch_Tour_2011

http://www.myspace.com/jesseleven

Bunny Hoopstar, our hoop teacher, has contributed to this book, Amongst Sisters, which is being launched in Marrickville this month.

http://amongstsisters.wordpress.com/

I have other friends who have started and run their own businesses, but that's enough for now. Well done all!

Fast Food with No Toys

2011-08-28T21:39:00.000-07:00

You may have heard in the news last week that KFC will no longer be inlcuding toys in their kids' meals. Good move. Junk Busters is running a campaign to ask the other fast food busineses to follow suit. Says Parents Jury 'This is a first for Australian fast food chains, after several US cities, including San Francisco banned toys from children’s fast food meals earlier this year.'

You can add your voice here:

http://junkbusters.com.au/act-now/

I mentioned the environmental cost of all these toys going to landfill. Really, no-one needs them.

And they market M rated movies to children, as if those movies are suitable for children, when they're not. So, the sooner the toys go, the better.

Changing Face

2011-08-28T00:23:00.000-07:00

When I was about ten years old, I had four teeth removed. My teeth were coming in crooked, and there wasn’t enough room for them all, so teeth were pulled. That ‘s just they way it was done back then.

Now, the philosophy has changed. You don’t pull teeth if you really don’t need to. You expand the jaw to make room for the teeth. And you get braces.

All three of my kids are likely to need expanders and braces. I’ve been asking the orthodontist we’ve been visiting about the change in policy. She’s just keeping an eye on the kids to see when is the right time to start intervening and doesn’t charge until the process starts. To her credit she has told us that we don’t need treatment. No-one died from having crooked teeth. But I’m well aware that people are judged on appearance, and having straight teeth does matter. She’s assured me that although the children’s faces will change, she won’t let them look like they aren’t my children anymore. Thanks. I’ve asked my dentist too. Why the change in policy? He told me that, because I’ve had four teeth removed, I have unsupported lips. Unsupported lips. I spent the next day wondering how my life would have been different if I’d had supported lips. My face would have been different if I had kept all my teeth. And, being in my mid forties now, I’m aware that your teeth do start to deteriorate and the longer you can keep your own teeth the better.

So, intervention either way changes the shape of your face. Is it better to expand the jaw and make the teeth fit, or remove teeth to allow room for them to be straight? Or to just accept crooked teeth and not mess with the shape of your face?

Strange how I wouldn’t dye my children’s hair, or tattoo them, but I’m prepared to change the structure of their faces.

At the moment, we’ll be going with expanders and braces.

Idle parenting

2011-08-24T16:51:00.000-07:00

http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/life/why-lazy-parents-make-happy-families-20110824-1j94e.html

A piece today about a new book, 'The Idle Parent', by Tom Hodgkinson, who lives in the UK. This is in reaction to helicopter parenting and over-scheduled children. He teaches his kids Latin and Greek at home, so that might colour your view of him.

If you read the article, I think you get the idea, and won't need to buy the book.

I've read a similar book by Muffy Mead-Ferro called 'Confessions of a Slacker Mom' which I picked up second hand for $3. I don't know why these kinds of books have titles that make the parents sound negligent when they aren't, eg, 'Mommies Who Drink'. Part of the genre.

In my course at the moment we have been talking about kids being coached for selective schools. Is it any different from kids being coached to attend sports high school, or visual arts, or performing arts schools? Probably not. Working hard leads to achieving goals. That's not a message to be sneezed at. When it is at the expense of free time and socialising and having fun and gong to the occasional party - that's when it becomes a problem and unhealthy for the family, in my opinion.

Is my family over-scheduled? Yes. During the week. But weekends and holidays are free. Do we have lots of free time? Yes. The kids have playdates and time to moosh about. We have dinner at the table together every night. They go to bed at a decent time. They eat good food. As my friend who is a mother of five says, 'It isn't rocket science.' Simple things first - food and sleep. No amount of coaching will help if the children eat rubbish food and are tired.

The family party

2011-08-20T01:52:00.000-07:00

I’ve been cool as a cucumber all week. I’ve had one child or another, or two, home sick every day. I’ve been going to the gym at night, doing uni readings at the doctor’s waiting room, and generally just rolling with it. Tomorrow I have the extended family coming over for lunch, as I do every August. I started because my family is big and my parents are old. They can’t host a full family gathering anymore. So they host smaller ones, and I host this one. And now I’m getting stressed.

When I started we weren’t really used to having parties. I’d go a bit mad. I’d yell at everyone while I’d spend two days cooking and cleaning. For the first one we didn’t have enough chairs, and I had to borrow from the neighbours. Another time I didn’t have enough cutlery and some of my guests ate with plastic baby spoons. One day it was very hot and my partner said we couldn’t sit everyone out in the blazing sun so my daughter smothered them in sunscreen and everyone wore a hat - mostly a hat from our dressup box. No-one complained. Everyone was happy. I need to remember that no-one is coming to inspect my house, and just as well.

I’ve had the kind of day where I’ve boiled the kettle a few times to make a cup of tea but haven’t actually got to make the tea. So now I’m just having a coffee. I’ve taken Clancy to the doctor’s this morning and spent an hour waiting for her prescription to be filled. I’ve shopped for groceries and bought some plates from an op-shop. I’ve made three desserts with three different children, because Clancy tells me it isn’t nice to be told she can help by staying out of the way. I’ve abandoned any hope of reading uni notes or going to the gym this weekend. I’ve combed three children and myself for nits because we don’t want our guests leaving with any unwanted party favours. I’ve upset the child who is giving up furniture for the 40 hour famine (and she gave up food for 20) by expecting her to sit down while I comb hair. I’ve brought in the washing but haven’t put it away. And I’ve just remembered that I haven’t bought my sister a gift for her birthday.

I’ve always told the children they can watch the M rated Harry Potter movies when they on tv as PG, and that’s happening tonight.

I’ll be going a bit crazy in the morning.

Having the whole family over also makes me a bit sad. It was at my place that we were last all together before my sister died. It was clear that she was dying, and she didn’t stay long. I was shocked to see her. She walked into my house like she was walking out of Auschwitz. She had Christmas presents for my girls because she knew she wouldn’t be here for Christmas and she was right. We took lots of photos.

This is what I’ll be reminding myself in the morning as I’m running around. The important thing is being together. Best to just keep rolling with it.

UK Riots, Social Justice, Behaviour Management, Education, and Ideology.

2011-08-15T06:06:00.000-07:00

Isn't that a snappy title!

This semester I’m studying, for my Dip Ed, units on Education and Social Justice, and on Classroom Behaviour Management. I’m reading articles by specialists in those areas, who, in ideology and ideas, are saying things similar to the experts who have been commenting on the UK riots. The causes and possible solutions. So, I’m pretty full of theories this week. Theories such as:

Welfare makes people lazy, and gives them a sense of entitlement. We need to cut welfare and provide stronger law enforcement.

People feel they have no investment in their own communities. There is no hope for their future. They don’t care. How can we give them reasons to care?

The gap between rich and poor is growing. It is only natural that the poor will rebel. The poor see the big salaries paid to people who don’t deserve it and are resentful. They know it isn’t fair.

We need to bring in compulsory military service.

It is caused by the breakdown of the family.

The riots are symptomatic of loss of the power of the church in society.

We do young people no favours by keeping them in school until they are seventeen - it weakens the education system for everyone. If we can’t provide traineeships or apprenticeships, lets look to fast food chains to teach young people how to work.

Everyone has the right to an education. Everyone in society is valued and should be heard and should be catered for.

This is another indicator that capitalism is failing. We advertise consumer goods to everyone, telling the population that they need these things to be valued/attractive/worthwhile, so if people can’t afford to buy these things they’ll just steal them.

The riots are the result of police picking on people for no reason.

These people need support. Pulling funding for community programs was the last straw.

If you measure the success of a society by how the most vulnerable are treated, the riots are a symptom of a sick society.

We need greater taxing of the rich to help the poor.

The rioters and looters couldn’t even explain why they rioting and looting - it was sheer opportunism. They’re thugs.

With rights come responsibilities.

In order to learn people need to understand why they are being taught, and then make their own meaning.

Everyone needs to feel part of a community. Everyone needs to feel life has some purpose.

It’s all about power.

The most vulnerable or marginalised people need more support.

People in authority need to be consistent, fair and equitable.

The riots show how precariously our society holds together. The pretence of civilisation is a thin veneer.

This morning I picked up a copy of The Australian at the doctor’s waiting room (Banjo has tonsillitis) (they publish a column bagging the ABC and SMH, and I’m not sure why I’m surprised...) and found this:

YOU are right, of course, Ros Kidd (Talking Point, 13-14/8). But nor was it the rioting youths or their parents who implemented the education and social policies which led, at least in part, to the unrest.
For that, you must point the finger at the moronic Left-leaning postmodernist social-deconstructionists in charge of the asylum. I wager that these misguided people, almost to a person, read and absorbed Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida with unmitigated glee.
Graeme Osborne, Southern River, WA

Well, that would be me and most people I know. It’s our fault. People thinking, or being compassionate, is the problem.

All depends on your ideology, which could do with some challenging. That’s what the UK riots are doing. Challenging our ideologies.

By the way, The Guardian Weekly put the story of the UK riots on page 12 of a 48 page edition. The lead story was on how India and China’s criticism of the US’s handling of their debts could be the tipping point of the transfer of global power from the USA to Asia.

The International Museum of Women wants your contribution

2011-08-14T05:02:00.000-07:00

The International Museum of Women is now accepting submissions of any media type for our new online exhibition,

Your Voices: On Motherhood. Submissions

are accepted online through October 31, 2011,

with a prize of US$1,000 to the Community Choice winner!

Submissions due: Monday, October 31, 2011

For more information: Visit http://www.imow.org or contact the International Museum of Women at submissions@imow.org

ABOUT IMOW: The International Museum of Women (IMOW) is an innovative global online museum that uses technology to showcase art, ideas and stories that celebrate, inspire and advance the lives of women around the world.

SUBMISSIONS WANTED

Artists, filmmakers, photographers, musicians, writers-IMOW wants to showcase your work in the new online exhibition Your Voices: On Motherhood. Contributions can come in any medium that is currently supported on IMOW.org (see below for details) and work must address a topic related to motherhood.

IMOW wants to showcase the experiences, ideas, joys and challenges of a new global generation on this important issue. What are your fears and hopes as you think about whether to become a mother? How is being a 'good' mother defined in your country or culture? How is mothering now different to your mother or grandmother's generation?

Potential topics may include but are not limited to:

Motherhood and Identity
Pregnancy and Childbirth - including maternal health
Work/life Choices
Motherhood Myths and Realities
Teenage Motherhood
Fathers
Grandmothers

Explore these questions and topics, or come up with your own. We encourage you to submit original art, creative writing, personal stories, journalism, music, audio, video, photography or animation for consideration, and take part in this extraordinary conversation!

Submit your work online today! http://imow.org/exhibitions/call_for_submissions?key=331

View the IMOW Your Voices: On Motherhood flier: IMOW CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement (MIRCI)
140 Holland St. West, PO Box 13022, Bradford, ON, L3Z 2Y5
http://www.motherhoodinitiative.org info@motherhoodinitiative.org

Motherhood: The Musical - recommended

2011-08-13T20:36:00.001-07:00

Last Night I saw Motherhood: The Musical and it was great fun. The audience enjoyed it wholeheartedly. Good on Sue Fabisch for writing the show. It has played in the US the last few years, and I hope it is regularly revived here. It deserves an audience. There are so many talented musical theatre performers in this country, and little opportunity for them beyond the big, expensive, cookie cutter musicals from Cameron Macintoch, so it is great to see them given this opportunity to perform. There needs to be room for smaller musicals as well. Granted, most of the audience were women, and it was probably mothers who laughed the hardest (we get the jokes) but I suspect it would also appeal to a wider audience (or maybe that's just wishful thinking on my part.)

Review from SMH here. http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/musicals/mummy-mia-here-we-go-again-in-joyful-romp-20110728-1i27v.html

True that it offers no great insights or solutions. But that doesn't matter. My view, today, is that it is enough that we see ourselves onstage. It's an accessable and enjoyable entertainment. (Which leaves room for another, slightly different type of musical about motherhood...)

You can buy the soundtrack here.
http://www.mommymusic.com/buy.html

What to Expect When You're Expecting - now a film!

2011-08-10T03:42:00.000-07:00

That's right. That sanctimonious, most popular pregnancy book with impossible to follow advice is being made into a movie to be released in 2012.

Details here:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1586265/

Should be interesting.*

* Code for 'likely to be rather crap'.

My advice for young women

2011-08-08T16:08:00.000-07:00

I’ve been thinking about what advice I would now give to my younger self, and what I would say to my nieces (if they were interested enough to listen to me) or to my own daughters. This is what I would say.#

* Don’t remove your body hair. Once you start you embark on a lifelong contract. I’d be very interested to see if the body hair I started removing as a teenager (underarm, and legs below the knees) would be soft and fair and fine, like my mother’s, if I never shaved. I suspect so. I’ll never know.

* See a colour and style consultant. It’s an investment that will save you a lot of money, and you’ll always look great.

* Don’t worry about what the guys are doing or whether or not they like you. Just do your own thing. Work on becoming good at whatever it is you are interested in. I spent too much time helping males with what they were interested in, at the expense of building on my own abilities. If a person you are interested in is interested in you he/she will let you know. Don’t go chasing after people. It’s undignified. People will accept what you offer (food, entertainment, sex), but if you keep offering, you’ll never know if they are really interested. Give people a chance to come to you. If they are interested, they’ll make the effort.

* Don’t waste your money when you’re young. When I was young some people spent all their money on drugs and alcohol. Some bought an investment property. Guess which ones are better off today.

* If you want to be a mother, just have one child. Two tops. We need women in the workplace. We need women to have more power and influence in society. Stay in the workforce. Earn your own money. Money buys you options. If you have more than two children you’ll be working to pay for childcare. The more children you have the more people are bringing germs into the home. The more people to keep an eye on and deal with all the people around them. The more children you have the more running around you do. The more children you have the greater the chances that someone won’t like the dinner you’ve cooked. With one or two children you can travel. You can bunk down at friend’s places. You are more likely to agree on things. Of course, if you thrive on living in constantly noisy chaos, and love combing every member of the household for nits on a regular basis, then go for it.

* Be careful who you breed with. You’ll be dealing with the person for the rest of your life, through thick and thin. The audition process should run longer than The Glee Project. Like The Glee Project you are looking for someone with shared values.Someone who is easy to work with. Someone who is stable, resourceful and has a positive attitude to life.

* If you don’t have kids, being able to cook is optional. If you have kids, it’s compulsory.

* If you want to have kids find a compatible job (ie, working at a school), or a partner who is able to earn good money working part time. If you can’t both job share, live near family members who are ready, willing and able to help. If not, then find or start a community of like-minded people, so there is always someone around. You need a network. My dream is to live with people who all work four days a week, so there is always someone to do the school runs and to pick up a sick kid from school. Share resources, share child care and household jobs, be a sounding board, support each other. Share some common space, but have our own spaces too. Communal parenting. Lovely. (Because it isn’t natural for one adult to be alone with children all day.)

* Taking care of yourself means getting enough sleep, eating fruit and vegetables, drinking water, keeping physically active, washing yourself, and either wearing sunscreen or staying out of the sun. Physically, that’s it. But you need to also look after your emotional health and finances.

* There are still some men in the world who believe women are lesser beings than men. Male friends of mine have told me that men just give lip service to female equality, but they don’t believe it. Behave in such a way that proves we deserve the rights our mothers fought for. Women are capable and responsible. We don’t want our rights taken away from us.

# Written the week I've had one child on antibiotics, one with a sore but not fractured arm, and the other came into my bed and vomited. If I was employed full time last week, I wouldn't be employed at all this week.

Raising a wee activist

2011-08-08T03:36:00.000-07:00

Here is the letter Matilda wrote this afternoon after reading the note she brought home from school. She's eleven.

To P&C Fete Committee,

Every second year, I look forward to, and enjoy, the (School) Fete. This year I am sure that it will be better than ever, except for the gender stereotypical note asking for donations to the Tombola stall.

The note requests:

Toys for girls up to the value of $10 wrapped in pink paper
Toys for boys up to the value of $10 wrapped in blue paper

Surely the committee doesn’t think that only girls would like “girls toys” wrapped in pink paper. And I am sure that it’s not only boys who like “boys toys” in blue paper. I would also like to ask you what you define as a boy or girl toy. Boys don’t only want dinosaur toys and Hotwheels and girls don’t all share a desire for Barbies and anything pink. As well as this, I remember that even in pre-school the concept of separate boy and girl colours was always meant to be avoided. How can this be encouraged by a primary school fete committee!

What I am trying to tell you is that our whole world is trying to eliminate gender stereotypes so why shouldn’t our fete? I understand that you can’t change that note, but I hope that in the future our entire school community is aware that gender stereotypes are not acceptable in today’s society.

Sincerely,

(her name)

Two parenting stories

2011-08-06T23:24:00.000-07:00

Two parenting news stories for today.

The UK government is endorsing a parenting campaign - five things parents should do each day.

Read to your child for 15 minutes
Play with your child on the floor for 10 minutes
Talk with your child for 20 minutes with the television off
Adopt positive attitudes towards your child and praise them frequently
Give your child a nutritious diet

I would have added one more. Make sure your child gets enough sleep. Nobody behaves well or is ready to learn when they’re tired. The 20 minutes of talk with the tv off could be taken care of by having dinner each night at the dinner table. And the playing on the floor applies only to younger children - just playing doing anything would be ok for older children.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/joepublic/2011/aug/04/parenting-tips-five-a-day

Some people find the idea insulting and middle class. I reckon any guidance the helps people learn how to parent (and lets face it, most people don't know how to parent until they have kids, and most just do what their own parents did, for good or ill), is a good move. If something similar was to be introduced here, I can hear the cries of 'nanny state' ( insulting to nannies?)

Also, controversy over the launching of a new toy. This is a baby doll that children can breastfeed. The nipples to be worn by the child are flowers, which is a bit weird. Normalising breastfeeding? Kind of. Stereotyping girls as mothers and nurturers? I don’t know. Certainly it’s a very gendered toy. I’d just say it is an unnecessary toy (as lots are). My girls have all pretended to breastfeed their baby dolls. Perhaps there is no market for it and it will die a quiet death.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/the-womens-blog-with-jane-martinson/2011/aug/03/breast-best-dolls

I could provide a roundup of news stories from The Guardian Weekly. Suffice to say the world is cactus, and I'll spare you the depressing details.

What the kids are into

2011-08-06T02:49:00.000-07:00

This is what my kids are into at the moment. We all love Horrible Histories, and this is the song of the day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQVa1Nb0eKI

Horrible Histories is now a BBC Proms show playing at The Albert Hall. It won a British Comedy Award for best sketch show, competing against adult comedy. My daughter, Clancy, only got into reading for herself when I bought her some Horrible History books, and we love the tv series. My kids are singing the songs. A lot.

The other thing they're into at the moment is Big Babies. You can have a look here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahyf-zCDAvE&feature=related

When they're saying things I don't understand, it's either from Horrible Histories or Big Babies.

The Festival of Dangerous Ideas

2011-08-05T16:46:00.000-07:00

http://www.sydneyoperahouse.com/about/program/festival_of_dangerous_ideas.aspx

To be held at the Sydney Opera House, the weekend of October 1&2. You can see the program and a list of panel participants here. Strangely, there isn't a list of who is sitting on which panel. I'm guessing Clem Bastow and Catherine Lumby might be hosting the topic All Women are Sluts. But I doubt there will be anyone who works with women traded into the sex industry, or victims of abuse. Seeing who is on what panel might give me a clue about what the topic Why are we Poisoning our Children? is actually about. Food additives? Sex and violence in the media? Arsenic? I just don't know.

I'm not sure I'll be going to either. I don't know that I'll be hearing any new ideas or radical suggestions re either topic, and I could spend my $30 an hour on something better elsewhere. And these things are usually recorded and uploaded so I can see the highlights from the comfort of my own home.

There are a few other topics that have caught my eye though. Society is Broken, and The Impossible: Communism and Anyone can make a Revolution. I wouldn't mind hearing Jullian Assange re Wikileaks, and Jonathon Safron Foer re food, but I get the feeling I already know what they're going to say. For$30 an hour, I want some really dangerous ideas. Something exciting. Something that makes me believe change is possible and we present at the discussion can be a part of it. But I won't know unless I go. A bit like a party for grown ups. I won't bother going if it is just a little tea party - I could do that at home - but if it turns into a rave, I don't want to miss it.

Bananas. Or yesterday and today.

2011-08-03T20:36:00.000-07:00

That was the day that was.

Here’s a little rundown of yesterday, and today, so far.

The day began with my dream of being hunted by murderous kittens. I kid you not. I awoke later than I wanted to, which I attributed to having a cold, and Cyberbuy asking if I am supposed to be up already. Apparently he had been awake for ‘hours’. I got Clancy up, and she cried saying that it was too late to go to band practice. We could have made it if we hurried, but she said the band teacher would be mad if she wasn’t early, so she went back to bed. I had breakfast and a shower. The other children got up and had breakfast. Cyberguy spent the morning yelling at Banjo, and making her scared and sad. She said he had poisoned her breakfast. He got angrier. I tried to muster the children in the right direction. Matilda was ready to walk to school, but Banjo wanted to walk with her but wasn’t ready, and Clancy only likes walking if we go the longer way. We were planing to walk together the long way. Then Cyberguy had a shower and was shouting ‘help me!.’ He was stuck inside the broken shower door. I had meant to tell him it was broken but forgot. He yelled at me and called me a prick. With no time to trade insults I left him there and drove the children to school. When I came back he was out of the shower (he’d dismantled the doors) and I drove him to the train station. Then I got some petrol, so I could give a child a $5 note for a sausage and can of drink lunch at the school fundraiser, and popped into the shops to pick up some buns, a lottery ticket and four small bananas at $7.99 a kilo.

Home again. Looked at emails and the SMH’s stupid story on Kristina Kineally’s new hairstyle. Reworked some writing for my first assignment. Ate. Tried to find my notes so I could blog about the mothering conference, but I've lost them. In the post received my free birthday ticket to the movies, so I might see Jane Eyre sometime in the next few weeks. Off to school at 11 for open day bearing boxes of tissues for classrooms. Visit three. Chat to other mums. Home again and submit first assignment. Ate. Packed for after school dance classes. Back to school at 1.30 for debate. Our team lost by a whisker. The adjudicator said it was the best primary school debate he’d seen. Home again to finish packing, and downloaded this week’s readings (I’m already behind). My friend rang to say her son’s party planned for the weekend was cancelled as he doesn’t want a party. There goes my social life. Back to school to pick up children. Clancy fell over at school and didn’t want to dance. Banjo was invited to a friend’s place for a playdate. Home. Sort the fete craft we’ve made. Took Matilda to dancing. Told the dance school principal that Banjo is dropping out of her class because they aren’t dancing to Cyndi Lauper. She said there will be a different teacher from next week. Back to pick up Banjo and drop off the craft items. Home to prepare dinner - shepherd’s pie so I could use up leftover mashed potato. Then off again to pick up Matilda from ballet. We saw the end of the class and Matilda fell onto her arm. She was shaken and crying. She puked into the bin. One of the assistant teachers is a trainee paramedic and checked her out. Got ice and a sling. She secured the ice in the sling. Asked if she had eaten anything unusual today. A banana? Made sure she was OK, gave us a vomit bag for the journey home. On the way to the car I sneezed a few times and wet my pants. We went home and I finished making dinner. Clancy was grazed in several places. Matilda feeling better but her arm, hand and wrist are sore. The Principal of the dance school called to check that Matilda was OK while Helen Reddy was singing ‘I am Woman’ on the radio. We ate. Banjo said she’ll go back to her class if there is a new teacher. Cyberguy came home and fixed the shower door. The children settled in their beds. Matilda got up, distressed, so I settled her in my bed. I told her I can take her to the doctor in the morning if she wants. I took an antihistamine and went to bed.

Morning, while discussing going to the doctor’s Clancy says she wants to stay home from school. I say I could take her to the doctor too, for her cough she’s had for two months. Matilda decides to go to school. Banjo drops her breakfast bowl on her foot and the bowl smashes on the floor. I write notes for two injured children and drive them to school. Then home for a shower. I drop off at school the project and jacket that the children accidentally left at home, and take Clancy to the doctor, who puts her on antibiotics for the crackle in the lung. The doctor says that Matilda’s arm might be fractured. I’ll take her for an x-ray tomorrow.

What's going on with gender?

2011-08-01T16:52:00.001-07:00

Two things yesterday.

Blue Milk has shared her experience of teaching a Montessori class of 5-6 year olds about the messages they receive about gender, and asks them to challenge those messages. Great work!

http://bluemilk.wordpress.com/2011/07/31/adventures-from-the-frontline-running-my-first-anti-sexism-workshop-with-young-children/

News With Nipples writes about Sacha Molitorisz’s article about poor female role models, citing music videos, magazines, and the film Bad Teacher. Great work NWN.

http://newswithnipples.com/2011/08/01/every-fictional-female-doesnt-need-to-be-a-role-model/

Some things about me

2011-07-28T04:21:00.000-07:00

My friend Melissa, from Through The Wardrobe, recently gave me a Sweet Blog Award. I'm supposed to state ten things about me, then pass the award on to fifteen of my favourite blogs. The problem is I don't really have those kinds of blog relationships. The blogs I read are not really sweet, or the blogger would have no idea who I am, and I would just feel a bit weird about doing it. Like when my friend asked me to be her bridesmaid at her wedding. I'm just not the type. (She chose a man instead.) However, I did enjoy writing down some things about me. So much so I'm just going to share them anyway.

* My nickname as a child was Bones. In my twenties/early thirties it was Anoushka, Nooshy or Nooshyburger.

* When I was in Kindy I got the chicken pox and all my hair fell out. It grew back twice as thick. (So at that time I was skinny and bald.)

* At high school I was in a production of Godspell. I played the prodigal son, and met my first serious boyfriend. It gave me taste for performance. And cast parties.

* I won an award for songwriting, bestowed by SCALA. The songwriting partner and I had written three songs together in one night. It was our first attempt. There is a pic of me on their site.

* The first cd I bought was Jeff Buckley’s Grace (even though I had a tape of it). I was a late adopter because at uni I didn’t have a stereo with me - my records were in storage - I just had tapes. The first record I bought was probably an Abba album.

* The first big concert I went to was David Bowie, Serious Moonlight tour, at Sydney showground, in 1983. I wore a boxy orange jumpsuit.

* I fractured my coccyx birthing my second child.

* At 19 I made my sister in law’s wedding dress. Now, I darn socks.

* I’m pretty handy with a hoola hoop.

* Most of my clothes are from op shops. That’s the way I like it.

* As a child I would ask my mum to quiz me on who won what Academy Award as listed in the World Book Encyclopaedia, up to 1971, when Oliver! won best picture.

* In the car I still play mixed tapes I made for parties I gave in 1985 and about 1997. I also play a series of tapes of songs I recorded from 2SM’s Silver Jubilee of Rock in 1977.

* Stories of alien abduction totally freak me out!

One day my head is gonna explode

2011-07-27T23:05:00.000-07:00

And today might be that day. Week one of uni and week two of term.

The kids have too many activities, in school and, well, in school. Opportunities, they’re usually called, but for me today, they’re called headaches. I’ve just realised I should change my uni enrolment because the units I’ve enrolled in for this term assume knowledge I haven’t covered yet. I need to be doing the less challenging subjects this semester, because I already feel my stress levels have risen to boiling point just reading about the unit activities and assessments. Household chores - never ending. Gym. I'm supposed to keep moving to stop my body from hurting. Volunteering. I do my share (and I swear, if the school calls for volunteers for one more function, I may as well just homeschool and be done with it). Sick child. Consulting with the village to make sure everyone gets to where they need to be. Thinking about how I’m going to earn some money but no time to actually follow through. Something’s gotta give.

And where are those missing library books and the missing birth certificate??

Take a breath and back to basics. Whatever I can’t deal with right now, I’ll think about it later.

In the words of Katie Scarlett O'Hara, tomorrow is another day.

Sydney has a problem

2011-07-22T03:47:00.000-07:00

Sydney has a self-image problem.

Sydney thinks it is sunny all the time, so Sydney freaks out when it rains for a week. The gutters overflow, the roads flood, the trains don't run on time. Sydney can't cope. Sydney is in denial. No central heating for rooms in Sydney. Open plan living areas, (impossible to heat) in Sydney houses. Nowhere to put umbrellas or coats. Because Sydney is always warm and sunny.

Winter Staycation

2011-07-19T01:01:00.000-07:00

Our winter holiday has come to an end. This time my plan was to have a good rest. We’ve mostly stayed home, resting. Perhaps a little too much. Our meals have become haphazard and slap dash. We remind each other to change out of our pyjamas if someone is coming over to visit. We remind each other to wash. Some days, that has taken all day.

Last term we had a few bouts of illness. The kids were each sick twice, in turn. I started last term with a bad back and ended with an infection that took three courses of antibiotics to get rid of (if it has in fact been cleared). Banjo has been doing bladder training. We’ve just been looking after our bodies. Haircuts and teeth. Back to basics.

Because it has been a break from school and uni I have been aware that this has been my chance to attend to a few jobs. We’ve been decluttering and cleaning. We’ve been making crafts to sell at the school fete. And I’ve read some books (that aren’t textbooks!).

I’ve been nodding my head in agreement at the two books I’ve read: Night Waking by Sarah Moss and How to be a Woman by Caitlin Moran.

Night Waking is about a family who is staying on a fictional island on the west coast of Scotland. The mother is an academic who is supposed to finishing her book on childhood in Victorian Britain, but whose partner is studying puffins on the island, leaving her manage the children, a night waking toddler and a son who worries more about global problems than is healthy (and probably has Asperger’s). There is much whinging about motherhood, much about the history of raising children, issues of class and the environment, and someincidental tips on academic writing. I enjoyed reading this, but I wonder how women stay married after writing such a scathing account of parenting with a constantly criticised male partner.

How to be a Woman is part memoir, part rant on the current state of feminism by UK columnist (I didn’t know who she was until I read the book) Caitlin Moran, whose photograph on the cover is part muppet, part Munster (and she wouldn’t mind me saying that.) I can identify with her childhood (large family), and most of the cultural references. Her take on feminism has three main points. You can call out sexism as rudeness. If the men aren’t doing it, why are women? And we can deal with feminine expectations by shrugging them off or laughing. Say no to wearing high heels, to Brazilians and cosmetic surgery, to g strings and trashy gossip mags. Say yes to women being funny. She talks about a few issues that are rarely addressed:masturbation, the joy of having a hairy muff, and abortion when already a mother (now there’s a topic no-one mentioned in the reviews - scares people off!).

We’ve had two little events to punctuate the holiday (because it is so sad when the children have to write about their weekend, and the highlight is going to the laundromat). Banjo celebrated her 7th birthday with a Pippi Longstocking afternoon tea, and we saw the musical Mary Poppins. The first big show for Clancy and Banjo. I’d say half the audience at the matinee we attended were children. Very lucky, affluent children.

So now, back to the madness of middle class mothering. My routine includes two school drop-offs most mornings, going to the gym, and studying. It’s going to a busy term - the children have lots of performances to prepare, there is a lot going on at school this term. And also this week, back to the doctor (my hip has been hurting for months, and lets see how that infection is faring) and, at the first opportunity, seeing Harry Potter. Can’t wait to see how the story is finished, and what is left out - because there just isn’t enough time to finish telling that story. And as much as the children would love to see the movie, we're holding fast to the ratings on this, and agreed they can watch the PG version when it appears on tv instead. All in good time.

Being authentic

2011-07-12T16:44:00.001-07:00

Two ideas I've come across lately are stretching my brain.

On the blog Zero Waste Home, Bea said she doesn't keep loads of books and artwork in the house because she realised she was keeping these things to show people what kind of person she is. (She also says she stores her books at the library, which is a neat way of looking at it.) Bea was an exhibiting artist when she decided to go zero waste. She said being zero waste has fuelled her creatively. She no longer has a workshop of art supplies calling on her to make something, and causing her to feel guilty when she doesn't. She can be creative where ever and how ever she wants. But she's got me thinking.

Do I keep lots of books in the house because I want people to think of me as an intellectual person? Do I keep artwork (most of it I have made myself) because I want to prove to people that I'm creative? Do I have lots of recorded music in the house because I want people to think I'm cultured?

The other idea is from something Richard Fidler said on his interview program on 702. He has an hour long interview with someone each weekday. He has interviewed a lot of people.

He said that people who have gone through a hardship (serious illness, serious car accidents, being left for dead at the side of the road and surviving) seem to then scrape away the artifice of modern life to live a more authentic life.

I wanted to ask him what he means. What does it mean to live an authentic life? Does it mean not using hair colour? Does it mean not bothering to make your bed? Does it mean being the person you see yourself as, even if that means applying artifice to do that? How do you know you are living an authentic life? Do you need to live with few possessions to live an authentic life? Do you need to be constantly confronting yourself to find out who you are? (Bear Grylls?) Does being authentic mean you say the awful things you may think even if it may hurt someone else, or can you be authentic and try to be kind? Is an authentic life one of service to others?

What if my authentic self has blonde hair? Is slimmer and has bigger breasts? Lives with lots of books and artwork and music? What if my authentic self is constantly on the phone or FB? Or really loves shoes? What if I really care that people think of me as intelligent, creative and cultured?

Will my daughter who is very attached to her long blonde hair - it is part of her identity - not become her authentic self until we cut off her hair and she confronts who she really is?

Does being authentic change as you grow up? Are we most authentic as children? Is that something we should hold on to? Am I more authentic when I'm tired? Or stressed because I have an assignment due? Or most authentic when I am well and happy?

Or is living an authentic life just one of those wishy washy things that sound good to say but we don't really think it through and know what it means?

Right, I'm off to get my nose pierced as a reminder to myself to live a more authentic life.

The Carbon Tax

2011-07-10T02:19:00.000-07:00

While the newspapers are emphasisng what the carbon tax might mean to household food bills (and why they don't look at other items people purchase, eg, electrical gadgets, toys, clothes, I don't know, and how they can predict prices in 12 months time in our changing time, 'hello bananas' I don't know) and the compensation package (when we became a nation of people with our hands out for compensation for every bump in the road, I don't know - but I can't see my generation toughing things out like people did during WWII) I thought I'd share the wins of the Carbon Tax announcement.

A price on pollution which big polluters will have to pay: $23 per tonne of carbon
$10 Billion investment in renewable energy
80% cut in Australia’s emissions by 2050
Assistance to vulnerable Australians totalling over $4 billion per annum
Starting to close the most polluting coal fired power stations and stop new ones from opening
$1B for the protection of Australia’s biodiversity, wildlife and woodlands.

Well done Australia. This is what we need. Tying the package to an overhaul of the personal tax system is a good move. And no, our household does not qualify for financial compensation. Our compensation is the possibility of a healthy planet. Thanks.

Now to pass it through Parliament...

Ann Oakely and Barbara Wooton

2011-07-09T17:22:00.000-07:00

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/jul/07/barbara-wootton-was-too-visionary

Sharing this article on Ann Oakley (longtime feminist writer - I read her memoir Taking it Like a Woman in my first year of motherhood - now professor of sociology and social policy) has written a book on Barbara Wootton called A Critical Woman. Wootton was a woman of amazing achievements, but she isn't well remembered.

An article worth reading.

Around the world - updating issues

2011-07-05T16:04:00.000-07:00

Time for a world round-up, care of The Guardian Weekly. (24 June - 14 July )

There is a new political party in Iceland that is shaking things up by holding some power yet not playing the political game. Jon Gnarr, a comedian, leads a party of ex-punks, poets and pop stars who formed The Best Party, and he has been voted in as Mayor of Reykjavik.The anarcho-surrealist party is shaking up a corrupt system, reeling from financial meltdown.

Women in Saudi Arabia are protesting against a ban on women driving in public by driving in public. Five women have been arrested.

Women in Afghanistan are the most at risk women in the world. The most dangerous countries in which to be born female are, in order, Afghanistan, the DRC, Pakistan, India and Somalia, according to a global survey.

A story on the sex selection crisis in developing countries. In India there are 112 boys born to every 100 girls. In China there are 121 boys to every 100 girls. The Chinese city of Lianyungang records 163 boys per 100 girls in 2007. The pattern spills into Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia and Albania. A book, Unnatural Selection, by Mara Hvistendahl, explores the trend, and looks to the consequences. "Historically, societies in which men substantially outnumber women are not nice places to live", she writes. It creates new markets in trading women.

The number of people forcibly displaced (in their own country or out of their own country) has reached a 15 year high, according to the UNHCR. Their report estimates 43.7 million refugees and people displaced by events such as war and natural disasters at the end of last year. More than half are children.

Julia Kristeva writes a piece on the history, and current state, of women's rights in China.

A review of the book Millions Like Us: Women's Lives in War and Peace 1939-1945, by Virginia Nicholson. The books uses memoirs of women during wartime. Eg, ' For a housewife who's been a cabbage for 15 years, you feel you've got out of a cage." Very interesting.

Diabetes is now a global epidemic. More than 350 million people in the world now have diabetes. It is one of the biggest causes of mortality worldwide, and set to become the single biggest burden on the world healthcare system.

Gay marriage has been legalised in new York.

Women in the US have been charged over losing their unborn babies. Bei Bei Shuai, 34, was charged with murdering her unborn child when, after her partner abandoned her, she took rat poison in order to kill herself. She was revived, but her child died. Rennie Gibbs became pregnant at age 15, but lost the baby at 36 weeks. Prosecutors in Mississippi found she had a cocaine habit, and charged her with 'depraved-heart murder'. She faces life in prison. In Alabama at least 40 cases have been brought under the 'chemical endangerment' law which has been applied in a way which was not intended when the law was introduced in 2006.

The richest people in the world have not only recouped their losses from the GFC, but are richer than ever.

A story on the huge female hip-hop scene in Detroit.

A review of the book A Quiet Revolution: The Veil's Resurgence from the Middle East to America, by Leila Ahmed.

A review of the book To Die For: Is Fashion Wearing out the World? by Lucy Siegle

Christine Lagarde, the French Finance minister, is the new head of the International Monetary Fund, and the first women to run a global financial fund.

A story on water - essential for life and running out. The 16 most water stressed states are in the Middle East and North Africa. Population growth, greater use of water, especially in agriculture, acquifers drying up.

Collaborative consumption is a solution to living unsustainably, presented by Australian, Rachel Botsman, in her book What's Mine is Yours: How Collaborative Consumption is Changing the Way We Live. The idea is to share what we have - cars, space, skills - using the internet or social networking, and based on trust. Botsman argues that soon our reputation rating, based on online feedback to services and online comments to assess our trustworthiness, will be as important as our credit rating. It does, however, need critical mass in order to work.

The Guardian has a page each issue on International Development, looking these weeks at Brazilian mothers working in trades,and microfinance in Cambodia.

The Guardian has been the go-to for journalists reporting on The News Of the World phone hacking scandal, and the subsequent folding of the publication. Cheers, Guardian. Well done.

I'm looking forward to their reporting of the Carbon Tax.

The Toy Sales

2011-07-05T15:37:00.000-07:00

Mums on the mum forums tend to get rather excited by the toy sales. K Mart,Target and Big W all have toy sales at this time of year. Mothers line up to get their children the toys they want, and put those toys on lay by for Christmas. Then line up to retrieve the toys on Christmas Eve.

The toys sales and our family have little to do with each other. My kids are kind of past the toy phase of early childhood. They don't need any more toys. For gifts I've been giving them gifts of experience or activities, like going to a show or having lessons. I'll buy them books and cds (we know where to store them in our home.) I feel like we have already had most types of toys (most we got second hand) and I've already given those toys away to friends with younger children or to the op shops. I should add we don't have electronic games, ipods or Wii - we just aren't on that page.

I did, however, pick up a catalogue from one of the shops and the children looked through it. What I noticed (aside from how gendered the presentation of toys are) is that the toys are now cheaper than they were five to ten years ago. How is that possible? What cost is not being factored into the equation? When we know that the earth's resources are limited (most of the materials are made from oil based products), and the conditions for factory workers in China (and yes, all these toys are made in China), what does that mean? Does it mean we don't care so long as we can buy our kids toys cheaply?

We can apply to same questions to clothes. Clothes are cheaper to buy now than they were five to ten years ago. How is that possible? Will that change with the introduction of a carbon tax? I hope so.

An article on how inaction on climate change will affect our children here.
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/climate-inaction-risks-childrens-wellbeing-20110705-1h0mj.html