waitangi day

waitangi day, again.

i started the day with a powhiri at civic square in hamilton, in front of the city council building.  following the powhiri, there were a few speeches, some songs, a prayer and then refreshements.

it was an hour-long event, which is time enough to hear quite a few words.  unfortunately i don't understand maori enough to follow what the speakers in te reo were expressing, though i did catch a few words here and there.

but there were plenty of words in english that i did understand.  speeches about partnership and founding history, and the importance of the treaty.  there were words about multi-culturalism and being one people.  there was talk of celebrating the positive and the nz spirit & identity.  people talked about finding the common and focusing on that.

and for those who did talk about the historical context of the treaty, they talked about the period between 1815 & 1840, they talked about what happened at waitangi, and the next historical point of mention was 1960, when waitangi day was legally established and then 1975 when the treaty of waitangi act was passed.

everyone mentioned the signing, the partnership, but not one single person mentioned the breaches.  it's as if the period between the signing of the treaty and the setting up of the waitangi didn't exist, as if we can't dare to acknowledge the problematic parts of our history.  as if, as part of our national day, we should pretend that injustice and dispossession never happened.  to mention it would somehow put a dampener on the day.

and yet part of celebrating nz and nz'ers, part of celebrating our history and our present is to own all of that history, to acknowledge the bad as well as the good.  because that is all part of what this country is, that is part of our history, and to erase it by refusing to mention that it happened only shows the speakers' shame and embarrassment.  it's certainly not ignorance, because i know all the people who spoke, and i know that they have a good grounding of our history - good enough to speak about it with honesty, had they so chosen.

it's not negative to speak about the bad parts of our history.  it's worse to totally ignore it and pretend it never happened. it's more respectful of all of us to tell the truth of what happened, and that can easily done in ways that aren't in-your-face or confrontational (though it doesn't have to be), even if it does make some people uncomfortable.  but just skipping over it as if it doesn't happened doesn't change the fact that it did.

it's positive to acknowledge our history and to talk about how we can make things better.  and to talk about all the people and institutions who have been working hard to make things better.  and to talk about all the things that still need to happen, all the work that still needs to be done.

the one thing that truly p*sses me off is to write off any mention of that history as "holding grievances" or being divisive.  there is absolutely nothing wrong to be upset about past injustices, and to talk about the impact they have even today.  there is nothing wrong with feeling anger and frustration, and nobody has to get over it just because other people are unable to deal with the expressions of justified emotion on a day when we acknowledge what it is to be a nz'er.

it is more divisive and more negative to stifle those expressions and to enforce a silence on things that we should never be silent about.  so, i expected more from the ceremony this morning.  especially since it was the only formal commemoration of waitangi day in the city.  hamilton used to have a full day celebration by the lake, at innes common, with stalls and food and rides for the children, along with music and performances from a wide range of cultural groups.  but the funding for that got cancelled, and this is all we have left.

i think we can do better.

Wellington launch of NZ 'Who needs feminism?" campaign

Many thanks to Sara for sending through the blurb used in Salient to promote this.  Facebook event here.

The VUWSA Women’s Group will be challenging misconceptions about feminism and demonstrating its relevance in today’s society with an exciting event this Thursday.

Inspired by a group of students at Duke University in the USA, The National Council of Women of New Zealand (NCWNZ) has this week launched its own NZ-based version of the ‘Who Needs Feminism?’ campaign – and the VUWSA Women’s Group is urging Vic students to get involved.

VUWSA Women’s Officer, Sara Bishop, explained: “This is a really great photo campaign which allows people to share a message about why feminism is important to them and we really encourage everyone – students and staff – to get involved.

“The idea is to show that feminists are not ‘man-hating’ and ‘bra-burning’ – feminists are people who believe that men and women should be equal.

“We also want to overcome the perception that we don’t need feminism anymore. There’s a pretty widespread belief that equality has been achieved. Even in forward thinking New Zealand, there are plenty of shocking statistics on pay equity, women in leadership and family violence. And that’s before you even consider things like street harassment and the pressures on girls and women to achieve a singular and unrealistic standard of beauty.”

The VUWSA Women’s Group will be taking photos for the campaign in Library Foyer on  Thursday, July 19 from 1pm. Paper, pens and even some suggestions will be provided, so all you need to do is come along and get involved. Pictures taken at the event will be shared on the NCWNZ ‘Who needs feminism?’ campaign tumblr page (whoneedsfeminismnz.tumblr.com).

Here's the NCWNZ trailer for the campaign:

best wishes

well, it's the day before christmas and i'll definitely be taking a short break from blogging. it's not a religious celebration for us, but a welcome holiday time. the waikato times did a nice piece on the various ways people will be celebrating the day, which features yours truly as well. i thought it was great that they

this may well be a difficult time for many people. there are those who have to work through, and will be hopefully take time off another time of the year. there are those who are struggling to deal with a celebration without loved ones. there are those who have suffered from natural disasters, and some of them may be struggling to cope - particularly thinking of those in christchurch and nelson. there are those who aren't able to get to be with family and friends, and others who are but who will not find this an uplifting experience. there are those struggling with poverty and not able to put enough food on the table, let alone think about presents. and then there are those of you who will find the day turns out exactly as you wanted.

whatever shape the celebrations take for you, i wish you all the best. i want to thank those who take the time to read, and to comment. apologies if you've felt that moderation has been harsh or that the space has felt unwelcoming at times for you. we hope that overall the site has given you something of value.

to my fellow bloggers, thank you for sharing being part of the group and for sharing your thoughts. the depth of experience and the perspectives you bring have been really important to me. hope to get back into it in the new year.

Two ARGHs in one morning is two too many

ARGH the first, was the news, via Russell Brown on twitter (@publicaddress), that Bronagh Key is down on the royal wedding invite list as "Mrs John Key."  I don't know who is responsible for this but it really bugs me that anyone gets to be differentiated from their partner by only one little "s".

If that's genuinely what Bronagh wants to be referred to then that is her choice, and I'll shut up about it (publicly, no doubt I'll mutter into my cereal about it privately).

But if it's been imposed by anyone, or just assumed, then that sucks.  Russell thought it was better than being John Key's +1, however I'm not so sure.  Both seem to me to indicate she's just an appendage, not a person in her own right.

ARGH the second, totally didn't have to be an ARGH.  The Unnecessary ARGH if you will.  Dr Tiso pointed me to an awesome set of bathroom scales (right) which are not only pink (win), fluffy (extra win) and decorated with a shiny star (ultra mega win), they also don't feature numbers but instead wonderful friendly words like "Perfect", "Hot" and "Ravishing."  The Yay Scale is the work of Marilyn Wann, a body acceptance activist who wrote Fat? So! and has done some great stuff with Healthy At Every Size (aka HAES).

So where's the ARGH in that, pretty awesome right?  Sadly this isn't the order I read about this Cool Thing in.

First I stumbled into a savage "review" (who reviews bathroom scales?) all about how the Yay Scale was apparently not so yay because it was Encouraging Unhealthy Eating Habits.  The reviewer has been put right in comments, although there's no response to the well made points about the positive nature of the scales.

I was particularly galled by the idea that those who wanted to know their weight might inadvertently purchase the Yay Scale and have to live in ignorance of their mass!  ZOMG False Advertising the Like of Which Has Never Been Seen Before!  Except if you count almost the entire fashion and beauty industries, basically.  But I digress.

Now I'm hoping for an ARGH-free Monday.  Might be lucky and get away with a few minor GRRRRRRs.

courage

[update: here is a link to the article on stuff about this wonderful young woman. and here is the unicef webpage, where you can make a donation if you wish.]


i went to a fundraiser today. i was invited by a friend of mine whose daughter is scheduled for neurosurgery this week. since she was going to have her head shaved for the surgery, this young teen decided to turn the experience into a fundraiser, inviting family and friends to an event that would raise funds for unicef.

it was a beautiful event, with 4 men and two other teenage girls shaving their heads in solidarity. there were songs, dances, poetry readings and a choreographer got us to do the moves to thriller. such a lovely event, a celebration of this young woman and what she has to go through.

this the second friend i have who has to deal with serious health issues that arose in their teenage years. the other one has a daughter who developed a degenerative disease. the girl doing the fundraiser today was diagnosed last year with a rare condition that will require surgery to her brain stem. it's likely that she will require more surgery in coming years, this is only the first step in a process. i can't imagine what it must be like to have to cope in situations like this. somehow, i don't think i would cope very well at all.

so i thought it was incredibly courageous of this young woman to put on a fundraiser, even though she was feeling incredibly nervous about shaving off her hair and even though she is terribly afraid of the surgery to come. it's not only the way she is facing her own situation, but also that she can think of others and focus on supporting others in the world is amazing.

i have to admit that i lost it a little when we were singing the second verse of "lean on me". and then again, when seeing the tears of the proud mother of one of the other teens who shaved her head in support. this is why i hate it when people carry on about "young people these days", because i seem to continuously come across wonderful young people. they're never perfect, but then neither are the adults around them.

it is in these everyday stories that we see the true strength and beauty of the human character. i'm truly humbled by this young woman, and i hope everything goes well for her particularly in the next couple of weeks, but also in the longer term.

a humble life, but well worth the recognition

i've been busy for the last little while organising the muslim women's conference in hamilton. it was a great conference, attended by 200 people at various points. we started on friday night & finished sunday around midday. the biggest day was saturday, as a lot of women are only able to attend for the day.

as i was busy behind the scenes, i didn't get to any of the workshops. i'll try to post about the topics covered, and the afternoon activities at a later date. today, i wanted to write about part of the conference dinner on saturday night. although we have been holding these conferences annually since 1990, this was the first time we formally recognised the achievements of muslim women.

there were four women who were recognised for their service to their communities. what i loved most about the women chosen was that they worked quietly, without ever seeking recognition nor making a big noise about what they were doing. more than that, a lot of the recognition was for "women's work", work that is generally devalued and little rewarded. the sort of work that doesn't count for much with a lot of people, but which takes a lot of time and energy, making a big difference to the way communities function.

i haven't asked three of these women if i can publish their details, so i won't speak about them here. even though they are absolutely amazing, generous, kind-hearted, compassionate and giving women & i'd love to write a whole post on each of them. but the fourth woman, who achieved a lifetime achievement award, is my mother. she was nominated by someone else, but i was asked to write about her life, and i've reproduced below the bio that was read out at the conference dinner. she knows that we will be sending this out to various forums and has given her permission.

i can't even begin to say how incredibly proud i am of my mum. it wasn't until i began writing about her that i realised just how much she has given. i don't think i've managed to convey her contribution adequately at all, but i hope readers are able to get a sense of it. this has been written from faith-based perspective, because that's who she is & it's the perspective that is most important to her.


Qamar Rahman was born in a small village near Banaras (Varanasi) in India, where she grew up and did most of her schooling. After marriage, she migrated to Canada to join her husband who was studying there. Four years later they migrated to New Zealand, and settled in Hamilton. Her family was the first Muslim family to settle permanently in Hamilton. There was one further family in Ngaruawahia & and another in Putaruru, with whom there was close contact. There was a larger Muslim community in Auckland, and the family would make frequent trips to meet with Muslims there.

After a visit by a group of South African Muslims, Jum'ah prayer was started in the Waikato in 1975. Initially the prayer was rotated between Ngaruawahia and Hamilton, but as the community started to grow a little, both Jum'a and Eid prayers were held at Qamar's home. She would clean the house every Thursday evening, then spend Friday morning cooking lunch, which included curries, rice & chapatis, for all the worshippers who attended the prayers. She continued to do this even though she had two small children with only a year between them, and no extended family support. It was not until the Hamilton mosque was purchased in 1982 that this work stopped.

Qamar has been a stalwart of the local community, and often put her time towards teaching others how to read Qur'an along with basic Islamic knowledge. She increased her own level of knowledge by spending time studying the Qur'an daily, and by investing in numerous Islamic books during overseas visits. For some years, she wrote and delivered a weekely lecture in the Urdu language on community radio, broadcast on Friday nights. She carried out extensive research of the Qur'an and Hadith to write these speeches. She also wrote speeches and articles in English which have been published in a number of overseas publications.

As a mother, Qamar encouraged her children to be as active in community service as she herself was. She was a devoted mother, teaching her children to love Islam and to always have high standards of behaviour. She taught her children to aim for the stars in everything they did - academically and Islamically. She understood that a vital ingredient in a strong community is the strength of the next generation. And so for many years she made this task of bringing up the next generation one of her life's most important works.

She also completed a bachelor's degree (with a double major in English literature and politics) at the University of Waikato, even though English was her second language and she had only managed to complete 10 years of schooling in India. Qamar first completed Hajj in 1978, and since then has completed Hajj twice more. She has actively been involved in social service, as many members of the community would come to her with their problems, seeking her advice and an Islamic viewpoint on the issues they faced. She has been extremely active in welcoming new members into the community and inviting them to her home, as well as taking the time to visit them.

Qamar has been a founding member of the Islamic Women's Council, contributed willingly to Annual Conventions and Youth Camps and has encouraged others to be active within the community. For several years she worked as a voluntary English tutor for new migrants. She has travelled extensively through Europe, North America, Asia and Australasia. She has never sought any position nor any recognition for her work, but has worked quietly all her life. These days, she devotes a large part of her days to prayer and worship, as well as encouraging others towards the same.

and so this is xmas

i don't celebrate xmas. no decorations, no tree, no presents, no family gatherings. it's not part of our tradition and we celebrate our holy days at different times in the year. so i look on at the whole christmas thing as a detached observer, untouched by what's going on but sometimes bemused.

my kids never believed in santa. i didn't ever bother with that particular myth, though for some reason i did go with the tooth fairy. go figure. i still remember when one of my girls was quite young, she was telling me about her day at school. they had had to write letters to santa, telling him what they wanted for xmas. i said to her "you know there's no such thing as santa, don't you?". she gave me that exasperated look the kids give their mothers, and said "yes, of course i know that, but my teacher doesn't!"

when i stopped laughing, i started to get annoyed. not because of the santa thing, but more because of the spirit of this activity. it was all about consumerism, about what you could get for yourself, and these weren't values i wanted my children to be growing up with. i would much rather they had to write a letter about what they would do for others for xmas. and that doing shouldn't about spending money to buy things, unless perhaps for the impoverished. it should be more about helping others, service, a look outwards rather a focus on the self.

it's hard to take the commercialism out of the image of santa. the use of santa at shopping malls to promote consumer spending really doesn't sit well with me. again, we have young children pressed to tell this old fellow what they want, of course with the purpose of pressuring parents into buying more stuff. but what values does it really teach?

it's such a pity because xmas could be about so much more, and i'm sure that for many people it is. for others, it's just a stressful time or a time of sadness eg see QoT on one variation of the subject. the sadness could be due the loss of someone close - thinking especially of the families of the lost pike river miners, those that died in the fox glacier plane crash, and all deaths from illness, accident, abuse or murder. there's the sadness for those who struggle financially and can't make xmas time the perfect time that popular culture tells us it should be, those who have lost their job or can't find one, who struggle on a benefit for any number of reasons, the abandoned, the lonely.

i won't be celebrating on saturday, but i'll be thinking of those of you who are. i know that we've struggled with the posting here over the last few months, because "real" life has taken up the time for many of our writers. but i hope they don't mind if i say, on behalf of all us, that i hope you have a relaxing and rewarding time over the next couple of weeks, or at least that you find some comfort. i'd like to thank all our readers for dropping by and contributing to our space. i'd like to thank and give e-hugs to my fellow writers here, for teaching me so much and for making me think about things in new ways or even think about things that i never bothered to give thought to.

kia kaha. have a good one.

marrying herself

hmm, i'm not sure exactly how to feel about this:

A 30-year-old Taiwanese woman has put an unusual twist on the traditional white wedding by ditching the husband part and marrying herself.

Office worker Chen Wei-yih said she wanted to show other single thirty-something women that they were not failures, media reported.

“I was just hoping that more people would love themselves,” Chen said.

Chen splurged on her $5,700 solo-ceremony, renting a banquet hall, hiring a wedding planner and photographer and inviting 30 of her friends to witness the event....

“It’s not that I’m anti-marriage. I just hope that I can express a different idea within the bounds of a tradition,” Chen said.

it's a strange paradox, to prove one's self-worth as a single woman by going through the ultimate ceremony of couplehood. i suppose it's a way of making a point, and i guess a "celebrating me, as i am" type of party would have seemed a bit vain & egotistical. and yet, the latter is actually what she's doing, and i think it's a good thing to be happy with what you've achieved in life so far, and to be happy with who you are and how you are. now that is definitely something to celebrate.

Suffrage Day!

Cross posted

On this day, 117 years ago, women in the New Zealand got the right to vote. On 19 September, 1893, the Governor, Lord Glasgow, signed the Electoral Act giving all New Zealand women the right to vote. New Zealand was one of the earliest self-governing territories in the world to enfranchise women, and the earliest nation to do so. It's a proud moment in our history. Alas, it took another 26 years before women were entitled to stand for Parliament, and another 14 years after that before Elizabeth McCombs became the first woman to win a seat.

The suffragists fought a long battle to gain the vote, presenting three massive petitions to Parliament. The third and final petition had 32,000 signatures on it. The petition is on display in the National Archives in Wellington, and you can walk in there and take a look, just like that.

When I looked at the 1893 suffrage petition, what struck me was the street addresses of the people who had signed it. There was signature after signature from the same street. It is a record of a woman, or perhaps a man, going from door to door, up and down the streets, knocking and asking for signatures.



There's a lovely story about one signature on the petition. It comes from Mrs Perryman's account of the suffrage campaign and voting for the first time on the elections.org.nz site.

It meant hard work to collect those signatures, and we met many women who told us quite emphatically they wanted nothing to do with politics. Mrs T. E. Taylor, wife of a very prominent independent member [of Parliament], used to tell a good tale about one of these reluctant women. The lady firmly declined to sign the petition, and firmly shut the door in Mrs Taylor's face. But before Mrs Taylor could reach the front gate she was called back. 'Yes', said the lady, 'I will sign your petition, just to vote against that man Tommy Taylor'.

If you are in Wellington, do take a moment to have a look. The Archives are at 10 Mulgrave Street, just across the road from the Thistle, where Te Rauparaha is said to have had a drink from time to time, and one block over from Parliament.

Happy Suffrage Day!

And here's some Suffrage Linky Love:
Friday Feminist - Women's Christian Temperance Union
It's not about the balls, Chris
Women's Suffrage Day


Feel free to add links to more posts in comments, I'll add them in if I get a chance :-)

Guest post: school balls, queer* youth and Stonewall: How far have we come?

THM reader Louise gives us the rundown on an upcoming queer pride event in Dunedin, and the history behind it.

On the 28th June 1969 Stonewall, a prominent gay bar in New York, was raided by the police; the patrons of Stonewall resisted and five days of rioting ensued. At this time, police would regularly raid clubs, arresting people with no identification or those who broke the law regarding gendered clothing. In New York the law stated that one must wear a certain amount of clothing appropriate to one’s sex; women were required to wear at least 3 items of female clothing. The start of the ‘Gay and Lesbian’ civil rights movement is often linked with the Stonewall riots. Stonewall represented an instance of solidarity with global implications and was one of the catalysts for the rise of the Gay and Lesbian liberation movement in New Zealand.

This Sunday, 28th June 2009, Dunedin will hold a queer pride event, Stonewall Dunedin, to celebrate 40 years since Stonewall, to affirm diversity and to support queer* people in our community.

While this event will be a celebration of the queer community, the impetus for this event is not all positive. The majority of teenagers are quite excited around this time of year; it is school ball season. However, in Dunedin a number of schools have refused students the right to bring same-sex partners to their formal. This appears a blatant breach of an individual’s basic human right to not be discriminated against on the basis of sexual orientation.

The Star, a Dunedin community newspaper, devoted 5 pages to this issue. These policies, which deny students the right to bring same-sex partners to the school ball, demonstrate the disregard that our schools have for queer* students. These students face a myriad of discrimination within the school environment: bullying, both physical and verbal; heterosexism within sexual health education – hell – one could argue the entire curriculum is heterosexist! There is a general lack of affirming support for diversity within the school structure.

It is important to note, however, that some schools are making positive steps towards providing a safer environment for queer* students. The Star shows, for example, that some schools in the Dunedin area support diversity and allow young people to bring same-sex partners to school balls. However, such schools are by far the minority.

This is not a regional issue, nor is it a one-off issue. Last year a similar problem was faced by young people in Auckland where students had to sign a pledge stating they were same-sex attracted in order to bring a same-sex partner to their balls.

The question this raised for me was simple: We’re 40 years on from Stonewall and what has changed? Yes, we can argue that we ‘know’ homophobia and transphobia are wrong, and certainly the existence of same-sex attracted and gender/sex diverse people is more widely accepted. However, I ask – has homophobia and transphobia simply become more insidious? Are we actively affirming diversity? Are we supporting our kids, our young adults, and our adults in their sexuality and/or sex/gender? Or have we just become subtler in our discrimination?

In the last 40 years a lot has changed in New Zealand: we decriminalised homosexuality in 1986; same-sex couples were granted the ability have a civil union in 2004; the Human Rights Commission’s Trans Inquiry got reasonably positive press in 2008. It is certainly important to acknowledge these changes, however, the flipside is equally important to acknowledge. We still exist in a society where trans and same-sex attracted people are subject to physical and verbal abuse; ‘gay’ is consistently used as a derogative statement (along with countless other similar words and phrases); schools often do not acknowledge or allow their queer students to express themselves, let alone thrive; and it is acceptable to accuse Helen Clark of being a lesbian, as if it would be a bad thing if she were!

What I’m left with is that well-known phrase: ‘Houston, we have a problem’.

I may have a utopian vision for New Zealand, or quite possibly it is my left wing queer politics stamping its foot, but is it really too much to ask that we support our youth, our wider community, in their sexual orientation and their gender/sex expression?

The “Youth ’07 New Zealand Health and Wellbeing”i survey found that:
54% of queer youth had been hit or harmed compared with 42% of straight youth,
Of those who were bullied
- 5 times as many (33% vs 6%) were bullied because they were queer or because people thought they were queer,
- Queer youth are twice as likely as straight youth to have run away from home,
- Queer youth are 3 times more likely to get depressed than straight youth,
- Queer students were more than 2 times as likely to deliberately self-harm than straight youth (53% vs 19%),
- Queer youth are at greater risk of alcohol and drug misuse than straight youth,
- Queer youth were 3 times more likely to have had a sexually transmitted infection than straight youth.

Surely, these are indicators that something is not right in our schools and communities.

Numerous studies support the implementation of queer-positive (not simply queer-tolerant) policies within our schools. A 2006 study suggested that the process of dealing with queer identities, often without support, meant that young people were delaying other life skills, mainly, career development. The study showed that higher levels of support, including friends, role-models, family and staff, lead to a lessening of anxiety about self identity and therefore help in all round psychological development. Out-there, a joint Queer Youth Development project between the New Zealand AIDS Foundation and Rainbow Youth, is making a difference to queer youth as well as the Safety in Schools for Queers programme.

The impact of heterosexism is widespread; the assumption that everyone is ‘straight’ is just as damaging as blatant homophobia. Not allowing young adults to bring their same-sex partners to the ball, or having alternate policies for queer couples than straight ones, is discrimination. And what message is that teaching us? The message sent out to our young people, our teachers, and our wider community, whether queer or straight, is that we should not value diversity. I believe the way schools, universities, workplaces, etc. deal with sexuality and gender/sex affects everyone. We need environments where diversity is celebrated and respected.

So 40 years on from Stonewall, let’s celebrate what we have achieved, let us show young people that being queer* is ok, that sexuality and gender/sex diversity is something to celebrate. Let us all think about things we can do that will make a difference for our youth, for the queer community, and for encouraging acceptance of diversity in our wider community. If you are in Dunedin on Sunday between 12-3pm, come along to the Octagon (it is a straight-friendly event), and show your support for diversity.

Click through for the Facebook page for the event!

*Queer is a reclaimed word used to represent sexual/gender/sex diversity and includes anyone who identifies as lesbian, gay, bisexual, asexual, trans, intersex, takatāpui, fa’afafine, queer and questioning. It is acknowledged that Queer is not the preferred term for everybody.

24 shitty hours

Boy, my almost three year old irrepressible cheeky monkey of a son, has had swollen lymph nodes, so his dad took him to the doctor yesterday morning. The doctor said it was almost certainly nothing - but there was a teeny tiny chance it was leukemia. That's right: the doctor dropped the 'L' bomb.

It's funny how the tiniest portion of a miniscule possibility can knock you right on your parental arse. Against all logic, my partner and spent the day almost in anguish. At one stage I sequestered myself in the loo at work, so my colleagues wouldn't see me sniffling. I couldn't wait to get home to see Boy, who rewarded my concern by climbing along the back of the couch and jumping on my head from behind.

This morning, Boy's lymph nodes are smaller, and it seems like the sun is shining again after a storm. Everything's in perspective once more, and the possibility of Boy having cancer appears exactly as it is - almost nil.

So I feel like a bit of a dick. But mostly, I feel grateful for having that thing which is so easy to take for granted: healthy, happy children.

Quick Hit: RIP Barbara Ringer

From the LA Times Obituaries last week:

...Barbara Alice Ringer was born May 29, 1925, in Lafayette, Ind., and was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of George Washington University in 1945. She earned a master's degree at George Washington in 1947, then went to Columbia as one of the few women in her law school class.

In 1971, after 22 years at the Library of Congress, Ringer was passed over for the job of register of copyrights, the nation's top copyright position. She had stellar performance reviews and had held the office's No. 2 position for five years, but the post went to a man.

Ringer filed a job discrimination suit, then moved to Paris for two years to work for the United Nations.

A federal hearing examiner found "a consistent pattern of discrimination" and concluded that Ringer had been wrongfully denied the position because she was a woman and because she was a vocal proponent of promoting African Americans at the library. In 1973, a federal judge ordered that Ringer be installed as the register of copyrights. She was the first woman to hold the job.

Click through for the whole obituary.

This was less than forty years ago.

Purple felt cloche tipped to reader Alex for emailing me about this.

That guy's a legend!

Not all blokes think women's reproductive systems are a scary enigma, a cause of domestic violence, or a bit of a joke.

Waiting for a doctor's appointment, I picked up a (so called) women's magazine from late last year. Inside was the great story of ex-All Black Junior Tonu'u, his wife, and the birth of their daughter.

When Tonu'u's wife went into labour he drove her to hospital, where the couple were told to return home until the labour progressed further. But according to the article, by the time they got back home, Tonu'u could tell by his wife's screams that she was in the second stage of labour.

Tonu'u delivered his baby daughter, ringing 111 for instructions. He gently removed the baby's umbilical cord from around her neck. After the birth, he realised his wife was at risk of haemorraging, so he kept a close eye and made her as comfortable as possible until the ambulance arrived.

The thing I loved about this story was not the drama or heroism, but the way Tonu'u cared for his wife and daughter, understood his wife's body, and helped without being grossed out by all that 'woman stuff'. I reckon that if Junior Tonu'u can deliver a baby without breaking a sweat, those men out there who are scared of PMS can learn to handle the jandal.

Christmas musings

I spent the Christmas mornings of my childhood in Mass, somewhat resentfully, bursting to go back home and play with my new toys. At least my siblings and I were allowed to open our presents before we went. You could tell by the ants-in-their-pants behaviour of some children that they had to wait until after church to open theirs. Nowadays, I lure my own kids through the church doors with bribery, sneaking them clandestine chocolates and reading them stories while I assure them that it'll be finished soon.

Since I was a kid, I've been uneasy about the nativity story. Of course, in some ways it's quite lovely. Everyone likes precious new babies, after all. But I always felt that Mary was the true hero of the piece.

Mary is a powerful symbol in the church tradition, representing bravery, compassion, and the beauty of a mother's love for her child. She's also, in my mind at least, a figure representing particularly female kinds of suffering which we're still stuck with two millennia later.

For starters, Mary was fourteen and unwed at the time of Christ's conception, at a time when execution by stoning was the penalty for sex outside marriage. She got married to Joseph - whether she fancied him or not, probably. She was in labour while traveling on a donkey to the strange town of Bethlehem, where she was compelled to go to take part in a census. And there she gave birth, most likely in terror, in a dirty stable and surrounded by animals.

When I ponder the nativity story, I can't help but think of what it must be like to be a pregnant teenager, feeling scared and alone. I think about women in poor countries who give birth without medical help on hand, some of whom die. I can't help but think about women without homes over Christmas, living with their kids in Women's Refuges across the country.

Even though I've spent the last three decades giving the story of the nativity a perverse feminist reading, I can't help but like it. It's a story of suffering, but also a celebration - not just of the birth of a baby, but of the courage under incredible adversity of the woman who brought this baby into the world, and the women who continue to bear and raise children under sometimes terrible conditions. Kia kaha.

women's voices

some good news today: asoka basnayake who produces the "women's voices" programme has won an award at the Annual Micies awards by Planet FM for an election special programme she produced. they station appreciated her initiative of interviewing ethnic candidates from most parties and her show was apprently one of a kind during this election campaign. this is asoka's third award since she started broadcasting

it's great that the programme is now available on line via livestreaming, and there are some archived programmes on the site as well (click on the "support services" tab). it's always great to see ethnic women doing well, and knowing the work asoka puts into this programme, i know the award is very well deserved.

Feeling hopeful on White Ribbon day

I was delighted this morning when I got off the train, and was greeted by a uniformed police officer handing out white ribbons to raise awareness of violence against women.

The reason I was so pleased was that, a few weeks ago, I heard a senior Police officer speak candidly about his experience trying to get his colleagues to take domestic violence seriously. He'd had a hard road. For a long time, the Police scarcely registered domestic violence as a crime; and when they did, they began to count the incidence, but did little else. Violence committed in the home were less likely to be recognised as such by Police than violence which took place outside it.

However, over the last few years, the Police have overhauled their approach to domestic violence, implementing a range of new procedures two years ago. These include much improved training for officers, mandatory reporting procedures and follow up after domestic violence call outs.

These changes may not sound like much, but they're a vast step forward from the predominant view of twenty years or so ago, that what happened behind closed doors was no one else's business. Having a woman in a blue uniform hand me a white ribbon is a clear statement that domestic violence is everyone's business.

Of course, the most crucial change in thinking needs to happen amongst those who perpetrate domestic violence. To that end, it was great to see men involved in White Ribbon day, and appearing on the promotional posters. Thanks lads!

Fairy bread and roses

Two weeks have passed since my daughter's seventh birthday party, and my post-traumatic stress syndrome has started to wane just enough that I feel I can begin to talk about it.

Children's birthday parties are a source of profound angst for me - political, social and moral angst. I have a cousin who, as a boy, had some mild behavioural and developmental difficulties, but was a fundamentally good kid. A child in his class threw a birthday party, and invited every single one of his classmates except my cousin. It was a shitty, cruel thing to do, and clearly the birthday child's parents should have known better. You can imagine the effect it had on my cousin and his parents. From the day I heard about this, I vowed to avenge birthday-related injustice whenever it arises.

My daughter's sixth birthday was the first on which she'd ever had a large bunch of friends to invite. My philosophy is that you must either invite a very select group of friends, so the omitted friends know that it's nothing personal, or you have to invite everyone so that no one feels excluded. My daughter and I couldn't agree on the select group, so we ended up inviting her whole class plus her non-school friends. (A fundamentalist Christian family had the audacity to send along a non-invited smart arse of an older sibling while the parents themselves did not attend, which flies in the face of all birthday party etiquette I know of.) So as not to discriminate against low-income families, I instituted a 'no presents' rule, which the well-to-do families ingored, thus drawing even more attention to the low-income families who didn't bring presents. (I had to chuckle, though - my daughter's best friend gave her a submarine she'd made herself out of her mother's empty Winfield packets).

It took me a full year to recover from the sixth birthday, which was logistically more challenging to organise than the Beijing Olympics. My friend has a baby daughter with a birthday close to my daughter's, so we decided to hold a joint first and seventh double birthday party extravaganza. Both being busy working mums, we liked the economies of scale this was sure to generate. Both being crazy left-wing feminists, we didn't know how combine our radical outlook on life with the demands of children's partyage.

Me: 'Should this event have some sort of girly theme?'
Friend: 'Like Barbie?'
Me: 'I was thinking more along the lines of suffrage, but Barbie is good too'.
Friend: 'Suffrage Barbie it is then'.

So far, so good - we'd thematically combined frivolity with strong feminist role modeling (kind of). But now there was the fraught issue of presents to attend to.

Friend: 'What's your take on presents?'
Me: 'Hate them. Orgiastic capitalism at its worst, environmentally ravaging wrapping paper all over the place, shite plastic toys made by child labourers in oppressive regimes, low socioeconomic birthday attendees placed under needless pressure to enter into mindless consumption'.
Friend: 'Fun though'.
Me: 'Yep'.

We agreed there would be sustainable gifts only: recycled or home made. Or that's what I thought we agreed. I told my guests that the rule was sustainable gifts; my friend told her guests there was to be no presents at all. (As it turned out, both sets of guests generously defied the instructions, and brought the girls a lovely array of pressies.)

And then there was the issue of entertainment. Nobly, my friend wanted to do some science tricks for the children, and organise a treasure hunt based on decoding anagrams. I recognised the intellectual merits of this, but cautioned my friend that the kids would probably want to shove their gobs full of junk food and run about like nutters. In my experience, that's what kids like to do. Hell, some grown ups I know like to do it too.

My friend and I compromised. We'd have some structured activities, but nothing too cerebral. A pinata would add some vigorous activity to counter the junk food and encourage healthy lifestyle habits, we thought - but my friend expressed some concern at the possibility of a Barbie pinata. I wholeheartedly agreed. After all my criticisms of Tony Veitch, we were not going to let our children grab a stick and thump an effigy of a woman - not even a fictional, plastic woman. (In fact, I was mildly disturbed by the prospect of any pinata at all. We settled for a colourful donkey in the end, and I was deeply disturbed at the level of clobbering it took to yield a handful of crappy hard lollies.)

The party came and went, and the kids had a great time. And was this anything to do with the sound ideological basis of their birthday party? Not at all. Ultimately, it doesn't matter how austerely feminist and left wing your parents are - kids are kids. They like to shove their gobs full of junk food and run about like nutters. As I cleaned up the wrapping paper afterwards, I just took comfort in the fact that no one had eaten until they threw up.

Happy Fathers' Day!

I want to say a big thanks to my kids' dad, and to the growing number of other dads (biological and otherwise) who help out around their homes and with their own children.

As I write this, the Promise Keepers are organising a rally in my neighbourhood, to restore the role of fathers in families, and 'turn ordinary guys into extraodinary men'. Icky. I don't really want an 'extraodinary' man in my house. I'm a fan of the new breed of dads: the ones who don't feel like they need to call the shots in their homes, who don't feel their masculinity is somehow compromised by being affectionate to their kids and partners, and who don't mind folding the washing while they watch the cricket.

One of the happiest moments of fathering I've ever seen involved a bloke that I fondly refer to as Dynamic Dancing Dunedin Dad. My daughter used to attend a hip hop for pre-schoolers dance class and, to my surprise, most of the kids there (most of whom were girls) were brought along by their dads. As the class progressed, I could see Dynamic Dancing Dunedin Dad (aka D4) tapping his toes. After ten minutes, he couldn't contain himself any longer. D4 leapt onto the dance floor with his little daughter and danced like his life depended on it - like a man who'd spent his life with a secret hankering for hip hop. He danced so hard that his glasses steamed up. It was such a happy moment between a dad and his kid that I've never forgotten it.

So:

• To dads who don't begrudge taking a day off work when the kids are sick, thanks.
• To dads who get up to the baby in the middle of the night without complaining or expecting a medal, thanks.
• To dads who are happy if their sons want to play with dolls, and willing to kick a ball around with their daughters, thanks.
• To dads who understand that kids are things to be loved, not owned, thanks.
  
• To dads willing to admit that they actually like ANTM as much as their partners/daughters, thanks.
• To dads who appreciate and support the work their kids' mothers do, whether or not they live with their kids' mothers, thanks.

Have a great day!

My favourite ever Olympic story

This iconic photo shows the medal ceremony following the men's 200 metres at the 1968 Mexico City Olympic Games. The first and third place getters, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, stand heads bowed and giving a Black Power salute. They wore no shoes to represent black poverty. Carlos had his top unzipped to express solidarity with America's blue collar workers, and wore beads to remember 'those individuals that were lynched, or killed that no-one said a prayer for, that were hung and tarred. It was for those thrown off the side of the boats in the middle passage'. Their protest against racism saw Smith and Carlos expelled from the Games.

The athlete who stands in second place on the podium is an Australian guy called Peter Norman. As the three place getters prepared for the medals ceremony, Smith and Carlos discussed their planned protest. Norman asked how he could support them. Smith and Carlos asked Norman to wear the same badge as themselves, and he duly did: it read 'Olympic Project for Human Rights'. Carlos had left his black gloves at the Olympic village. It was Norman who suggested they share Smith's gloves: this is why Smith salutes with his right hand, and Carlos with his left.

Norman was reprimanded by the Australian Olympic authorities. When questioned by the world's media, he reiterated his support for Smith and Carlos, and declared that he was opposed to the White Australia policy of his own country. When he went home, his countrymen and women were less than admiring of Norman's stance on racial equality. He was widely ostracised by the Australian media, and passed over for selection for the 1972 games.

Although his sporting career was at an end, Norman continued to work for social justice, playing a committed role in the Australian union movement for twenty years. He suffered from a series of health problems, including depression and alcoholism. In 2006, he died of a heart attack at the age of 64. He still holds the Australian men's record for the 200 metres. (Despite this accomplishment, John Howard was criticised for showing noticably less interest in marking Norman's passing than he did Steve Irwin's.)

Tommie Smith and John Carlos attended Peter Norman's funeral. Both gave eulogies and were pallbearers. Carlos said of him, "... Peter never flinched. He never turned his eye or turned his head. He never turned to walk away from that day".

Take that, those who say that sport and politics don't mix!