Guestie: On Carrying Patriarchy's Baggage while We Kick its Butt

Thanks Jessie Anne for this contribution. 

Content warning: involves discussion of eating disorders.

I have the pleasure of knowing many amazing feminists; feminists working for social and climate justice, feminists working against racism, transphobia, homophobia. I know feminists who are working in their own way to make their own workplace or industry less patriarchal and misogynistic.  Feminists raising kids to be kick ass feminist warriors. They remind me what strength looks like. They ground me with something healthy to aspire to and be inspired by.

Lately I’ve been thinking about the internalized patriarchy that these women quietly carry around with them every day.  The baggage I don’t know they have which I haven’t had a chance to help carry. I’ve been thinking about how many of us have similar experiences, and if there are things we can do as a movement to help ease that load.

Being a feminist is kind of a tough gig sometimes, and, at least for me, it has meant some pretty high self-imposed expectations that I added to my already hefty list of unobtainable goals; complete with accompanied guilt.

My particular clusterfuck of internalized patriarchal baggage I’m focusing on here is my experience with eating disorders. It’s long and complicated, and not really a story I have time for here. Although I no longer define myself as someone with an eating disorder, in some ways it continues, though less acutely. I think anyone who has experienced an eating disorder know that the lines between ‘recovered’ and not can be blurry at best.  It started with dieting when I was 8, and has at different times involved vomiting multiple times a day for months and years on end; otherwise named Bulimia; the awkward unpopular kid in the class of eating disorders. It has meant a lot of things between that too.

It has meant secrecy, and shame, and often most overwhelmingly, utter mental exhaustion. Sometimes it was so consuming that I had little room for anything else. Sometimes it was less about what was actually going into my body, and more a hatred of my body that was so strong I barely left the house for days. Feeling repulsion and disgust for the skin you live within can be very near debilitating.

I am somewhat at peace with the journey around these issues with myself and my body being a lifelong one. This realization has led me to examine the pressure I have put on myself to be free of internalized patriarchy.

I’m not going to wake up one morning to find myself free from being triggered by comments or situations that make me feel the need to make drastic and unhealthy changes to myself. But I think I now know a place where I can calmly reject those thoughts before they take hold for long; a place which I consider a victory and has taken years of hard work to get to.

For many years I thought, sometimes unconsciously, that I could only be a fully-fledged feminist and activist once I got 100% over my eating disorder and my sometimes-general-self-hate.

Unfortunately, through my own interpretation of what it means to be a feminist, I’ve spent years thinking that I had to one day be a ‘fully formed feminist’ without hypocritical thoughts and with a impenetrable shield that deflects all patriarchal nonsense from piercing my external layer.

In some ways, I’ve labeled myself a feminist-in-waiting.

This may have, in part, contributed to my silence around my eating disorder. Maybe if people knew about it, I thought, almost subconsciously, my feminist membership card might be revoked, only to be returned once I got the ‘total-self-love’ stamp. The unobtainable expectation to be the internally perfect feminist has also led to feeling an added layer of unnecessary guilt. Cause if there’s one thing women could do with a bit more of, it’s guilt, right?

This expectation I set for myself for so long was largely self-imposed and the expectations self-created. But I do wonder how many other feminists out there find it difficult to talk about their own internalized patriarchal baggage. Looking back at conversations and dialogue around issues like eating disorders that I’ve observed or been a part of, I do think that there can be a sense of ‘otherness’ attached to them, which can leave you feeling like these things are experienced outside of our feminist and activist communities. This otherness doesn’t encourage inclusive and open dialogue when they might be experienced in the here and now.

A feminist friend and I also recently talked about the internalised patriarchy we carry into relationships with cis males in our lives. We admitted to each other (this after years of chatting about pretty much everything) how much we often are part of creating a patriarchal power dynamic in these relationships. Once it got down to examples it was kind of funny; and relieving! I wasn’t the only one, and she wasn’t either!

It’s just another example of how the reality of our lives as feminists is still affected by internalized patriarchy. Some of it is pretty hard to admit, too. My friend and I were both left shocked at the fact that we’d never been in a space where we could acknowledge these behaviours with others. Are we the only ones?

A very quick glance around the interwebs reveals many blogs and articles by feminists highlighting similar pressures; the pressure to be a beacon of pure post-patriarchal light in the dark and the silencing which comes with that invisible pressure.

Another friend helpfully pointed out, when I raised this topic, that the pressure comes not only from within the movement but from outside of it.  Impossibly high standards are made for us by patriarchy, and it seems by feminism too. But I think these standards are contributed to by the market-friendly co-opted parts of feminism which are at times hard to identify; the smiling and happy feminist front; the ‘feminism for everyone’, buy your happy relatable feminist T-Shirt here!

Maybe we could set up more spaces to discuss what patriarchal baggage we all carry; maybe that would help share the load. A lot of these issues, the internalized patriarchy shit we deal with in private, are sometimes subtle and unclear, even to ourselves. But it’s important we talk about them, or at least talk about whether and how we do. Because whether it’s a secret eating disorder or recreating patriarchal power relations in our relationships, or whatever else, these things can end up affecting not only ourselves, but those around us, and our wider communities.

I’ve come to realize and accept that many of us can carry the worst parts of what we are working to change within us, and that those parts don’t necessarily fall away when we pick up the axe aimed at patriarchy. The axe helped me cope with them; it even empowered me to eventually move beyond my eating disorder, but there are parts of me that remain affected. And that’s ok.

So what I would say to the 17 year old me, and any other young girl feeling so enraged and empowered by this new knowledge of feminism to put to her experience is this:

Being a feminist is a journey. It’s different for everyone. You don’t live in a silo that separates you from the influences of patriarchy. The parts of yourself that will be, at least in part, shaped and defined by patriarchy will come in different forms and will be different for everyone. But you can positively contribute to the dismantling of patriarchy even while having terrible feelings created BY patriarchy.

Patriarchy is fucked, but no matter how it fucks you up, don’t let it also take away your claim to being part of the movement to dismantle it. 

Guestie: We are all human beings that live on the exact same planet

This guest post has been submitted and written by an Auckland high school student, chelsea_makita.  She wrote it for a short essay for school and was encouraged to seek a wider audience for it by her teacher.

Why is it that people who are gay get treated differently? Well I think this is simply because of the fact that people don't understand how much they may be in love with a person. Whether it is someone with the same gender as yourself or different, everyone should be treated fairly and equally. From my point of view,  there is no difference. We are all human beings that live on the exact same planet. I think that people who are glad to be different are the ones that make our world, a proud and beautiful place to be.

Many people don't understand why some people are gay. They’re happy being who they are. They find it hilarious when two people with the same gender walk past holding hands. Do they really find it funny? or is it that they’re just trying to put people down? To be honest, it’s none of their business what is going on through other people’s lives.

This subject is a bit like racism, except it’s not based on coloured skin. People who have dark skin or light skin were born that way. It was god’s gift for them. Yes, they may not look the same, but who cares? The main thing is that they’re happy for who they are and where they come from. I don't think it’s fair that human beings who are different are treated the way they are.

Just imagine, if you were in their shoes, how would you feel getting called names? Don't forget that they have feelings too. Recently, one of my friend’s cousins committed suicide because she was getting bullied for going out with a person who walked like a girl, talked like a girl and even looked like one. I think if you're proud of your relationship and the person you are with, then there’s no reason to be ashamed of who you are.

We human beings are all the same. We choose who we want to be. Just because some people make choices that you may think is weird, that doesn't give you the right to act like a total bully towards them. Finally, I am proud to say that I stand up for people who are gay.

Guestie: Being Brilliant in the Classroom

Many thanks to an anonymous teacher who emailed this in.

Teachers often bemoan a lack of funding for education.

Yet I suspect I'm not the only teacher feeling deeply uneasy about the $359 million the government is planning to spend in education over the next four years. 

For teachers to complain of such an huge investment seems at best ungrateful and at worst, a confirmation of every stereotype of the unionised teacher out there: unwilling to compromise, stubborn and arrogant.

After all, why are we paying our worst teachers the same as our very best?

And there in lies the deep ideological divide between many in the teaching profession and the government. 

Because underpinning the initiative of lead teachers, change principals is a philosophy that talent is something innate which needs to be recognised and rewarded rather than something that is constantly being developed and nurtured.

It strikes me as odd that when it comes to our kids the government has embraced the vision that all children can learn. That it's s  a matter of good teaching that will, to borrow a talking point, ensure five out of five kids are achieving.

Yet when it comes to managing those entrusted with educating our kids, talent is in short supply. 

Good teachers need titles to make change and in the words of the Prime Minster "we are going to pay them more to get it."

To me this isn't good enough.

We should want expert teachers in front of all our kids and that's what we should paying to get.

Fortunately most teachers will quite happily admit that they themselves are still learning. More importantly, teachers will learn from anyone be it a 1st year teacher, an  internationally renowned expert and most importantly their students. Teachers know that what works for one group of kids will not automatically transfer to another.

Just as each kid has their own personality so too each class and school. The danger in paying to get results from super teachers is that it assumes the process of teaching and learning can be standardised - follow what the expert teacher to get results - when it needs to be personalised.

I know I'm not the only teacher who has taken an idea from an expert at a conference or a classroom observation and tried to implement it in class only to have it fail miserably. But then I adjust a few things and make the idea work for my learners or I try a new approach. Yes expertise is important but  just as important is that teachers know how to tweak best practice to fit the needs of the kids in my class.

It's what the New Zealand curriculum calls teaching as inquiry and what high achieving systems  strive for - all teachers need to be experts in how their students learn. 

On a more structural level teachers as a professional acutely feel the effects of income inequality in New Zealand. Even at the high decile school I worked at there were teachers dipping into their own funds for food, trips and schools. 

Throwing millions into establishing an executive level of educators won't help the 11 year old in tears because there are holes in their shoes and no money in the house until payday.

Yes teaching quality is the biggest in-school factor in, to borrow another sound byte, lifting student achievement. However it is those out of school factors, having enough food to eat, secure housing to avoid transience as well as sickness and above all a feeling of love and belonging which  have a far greater impact on our kids' learning. 

I'm sure my rant might easily be construed as jealousy - if I'm not going to get recognised and rewarded then no one else should.

However I don't actually have any skin in the game as I no longer teach in New Zealand. 

Would this announcement be enough to lure me home in the next few years?

No.

While my prime motive for moving overseas is for travel, the support and resources I now enjoy are well beyond what the education system in New Zealand is resourced to provide. There is more admin support, specialist help, a smaller class and more release time. I am still as busy as I ever was back home however I am now far more focused on teaching and learning.

Because while money is important, the most important resource for teachers is their time.

Rather than injecting a few thousand super teachers into our education system how about focusing on ensuring that every teacher and more importantly every child is supported to be brilliant in the classroom?

Guestie: Another Fine Myth

Big thanks to Deb for sending this in - very topical! 

It had all the ingredients of a classic myth.

The young, astonishingly beautiful blonde hero pitted against the Forces of Evil: AKA King Larry the Ruthless and his henchmen Ozzie the Spit and Cunning Ainslie. The little New Zealand battlers versus Wealthy America. And we all loved it. Against all odds it seemed that our young hero would win. But of course, as the saying goes; old age and treachery will overcome youth and skill – and so it unfolded true to form.

The reality is we’ve been sold another male myth with the Americas Cup. Both teams are middle class white men. Both support crews are comprised mainly of NZers and both boats were built by NZers in Aotearoa New Zealand. And our dashing young hero is in fact a very rich man, who will continue to get richer no matter if he wins or loses, playing with other rich white men’s boats.

While our nation has been feasting on this bloke-fest, a true group of little battlers have succeeded against all odds on the world stage. A women’s team, The Football Ferns, claimed a memorable 1-0 victory over Brazil in the Valais Cup at Chatel-St-Denis a few days ago; making history as the first NZ team to beat world champions Brazil ever. That’s EVER. It hardly made the news.

So whilst New Zealand prepares the mourning rituals for the guys, let us not forget that we are a nation of strong women. WE win. We win every time a woman succeeds. Go you good woman thing! We rock.

Guestie: The conversation Difficult Lemon is really fed up with having over and over again

Many thanks to Difficult Lemon, who you can find on Twitter, for this guest post.  She was inspired to pen this by recent local events and the Twitter feed of Melissa McEwan.  

[This is the conversation] I have had literally hundreds of times with various (white, heterosexual, cis) men who want to claim the label feminist by standing on a hill and pointing and saying 'there be sexism' 'there be racism' but resist any and all efforts to challenge individual incidents of sexism, ESPECIALLY if they themselves are being criticised.

1. ARE YOU SAYING MEN CAN’T BE FEMINIST?
Stop projecting your anxieties onto me. You’re a white male. You can do pretty much whatever you want. It’s a sweet deal.

2. WHY ARE YOU NOT A HUMANIST?
As long as there are men (and women, who are subject to the same negative socialisation), who would ostensibly be part of the "humanist" movement, yet retain a visceral and violent reaction to the feminine, there is no foundation for a sexless, "humanist" movement. This cross applies to anyone who tries to argue that the Pakeha party and the Maori party are moral equivalents and we should all just join the ‘equality party’. Bleurgh. 

3. WHY ARE YOU OVERSENSITIVE ABOUT RAPE JOKES?
Rape culture is real. You are not sensitive enough. These jokes are everywhere, unfortunately, and trying to keep my spaces clear of them is very important. The real thought police are those who made you think this kind of behaviour is normal, not the other way around.

4. WHY ARE ALL THE ACTIVISTS SO CRAZY, LOOKING FOR REASONS TO BE ANGRY?
People are angry for a reason. Try and listen to what they are telling you, fight through the defensiveness. This applies to white feminists like me too, our movement is pretty racist, we need to own that.

5. WHY ARE YOU ATTACKING ME?
Calling criticism attack is an age old de-railing strategy, so a conversation that should centre the life experiences of women comes back to you, and your hurt feelings. If you are a man and go into feminist spaces and make the discussion be all about you, this is a hugely damaging practice. Stop.

Guestie: Babe of the Day

Thanks to Maus for writing and submitting this. Readers may also be interested in an alternative set up just last night:"NZ Misogynist of the Day.".

In the past month or so there have been several ‘Babe of the Day’ facebook pages popping up. The worst offenders seem to be the universities, although some of the more questionable pages such as ‘New Zealand Pair of the day’ and ‘WINZ babe of the day’ have their authors and affiliations hidden. I was recently approached by TV3’s nightline for a feminist opinion on these pages, and although I gave a fairly lengthy and detailed report of the problems associated with the pages, it was boiled down to ‘Angry feminists are killjoys’, and I was subsequently told across various social mediums that I didn’t like them because I was ugly. Of course.

The biggest problem is the lack of consent. These pages are created without the subjects consent; in fact on many of them, you are unable to nominate yourself. So we have pictures of girls, taken from their private facebook pages, and posted for all to see, and for all to ‘appreciate’. In fact, on the most recent ‘New Zealand Pair of the day’ page, out of the eight pictures posted, four have the subjects asking the pictures to be taken down, something the moderators ignored. When I posted under these comments telling the girls that although facebook doesn’t care about sexual harassment, you could report the image as your intellectual property and they would remove it fairly promptly, my comments were deleted and I was banned from posting further. There was even a picture of a woman holding her newborn child on one of the groups pages, which violates several peoples consent.

NOTE:: TVNZ, after interviewing me and listening to me talk about lack of consent, used several images from these pages, WITHOUT GAINING THE GIRLS CONSENT.

There are of course other problems with these pages. The university ones are full of comments like ‘who cares what she studies, shes bangin’, and although some of them have men featured, the sexisim is very apparent; for starters, mostly the guys are ‘Blokes of the Day’, not babes, and the accompanying text reads like a dating profile; ‘Bloke is a great guy, loves puppies and kittens and volunteers at homeless shelter’, and other such harmless banalities. Another interesting thing is that there seems to be a semblance of ethnic diversity in the ‘blokes’, you have many from many races, and the photos are typical headshots. In direct contrast, the women are uniform in their race, invariably skinny, and all wearing not much at all in the full body shots (I want to stress there is nothing wrong with being white and skinny, or dressing however you like. I just wanted to point out the standards of beauty are surprising given the diverse populations of universities).

There are enough reasons to have body image problems, and it is difficult to succeed as a woman in a academic world without being judged solely on how you supposedly look in a bathing costume. The response to my ten second sound bite was enough to show the reactions you get for speaking out from a feminist viewpoint. And I’m sick of it. There are hundreds of articles about there about why we don’t need to be judged for our looks, about the issues we face in the workforce and academic worlds.

I really feel like we should have come further than this, that I shouldn’t have to be typing this, I shouldn’t have to say something as simple as gaining a womans consent before encouraging hundreds of people to jack off to her picture is not a hard or wrong thing. And I certainly shouldn’t be abused for it, or told that I am ugly and therefore worthless. Wake the fuck up people. Consent isn’t hard, and I’m sick of having to shout ‘Yes means Yes’.

Guestie: Who is Kristine Bartlett?

Many thanks to Rebecca Matthews of the Pay Equity Challenge Coalition for permission to re-post this from their blog:

An important legal case can put a previously unknown individual into the spotlight and maybe even make them a household name. It can also be a way for one person to symbolise the experience of hundreds of thousands of others.

Get to know the name Kristine Bartlett. Because this brave and hard-working Lower Hutt caregiver is the new face of the campaign for fair pay for low-paid women and for women’s work to be paid fairly when compared to jobs men do.

The Service and Food Workers Union Nga Ringa Tota is taking a case that aged care employers and the Government that funds them are in breach of the Equal Pay Act 1972 because of their failure to address the very low pay rates in the sector.

The union member at the centre of the case, Kristine Bartlett, is a long-term caregiver at Terranova Homes and Care. She says her hourly wage of $14.46 is less than what would be paid to male employees with the same, or substantially similar skills. Only six of Terranova’s  117 carers are men.

The new case is an historic opportunity to prove that female dominated care work is undervalued and underpaid as was so convincingly demonstrated in the Caring Counts Report.

This case heralds a new approach in the fight for equal pay and pay and employment equity in New Zealand.

The case has been referred to the Employment Court from the Employment Relations Authority. The Pay Equity Challenge Coalition has been accepted as an intervener by the Court. The status of interveners is a watching brief and they may possibly make extra submissions to those of the claimants.

Guest post: Abortion access being undermined in NZ

Reproduced from the November ALRANZ newsletter with permission from the really rather awesome author, Alison McCullough.

The Abortion Supervisory Committee’s annual report has been released. The report includes
the abortion stats previously released by Stats New Zealand in June (See ALRANZ’s August
Newsletter for a report on those, downloadable at www.alranz.org), plus a few extras and the ASC’s
commentary. A PDF of the report is available for download at www.alranz.org under “The Latest”
column.

As ALRANZ wrote on their blog, the impression the report gives is of a system that is increasingly unworkable, with fewer certifying consultants who, the ASC reports, are facing distressing amounts of harassment (as are patients and others associated with abortion care), and all this as timeliness of abortion care and uptake of early medical abortion are barely budging. No matter what the situation on the ground is for providers and women, though, you can be sure that Parliament will do nothing to fix any of it.

The ASC report addresses the harassment of certifying consultants and patients in general,
and of Invercargill staff in particular. Here’s what the report says:

 “We are … concerned about the impact of being known as a certifying consultant in some locations.  During the last year the Committee has heard distressing reports from certifying consultants where they, their families, patients and wider public have been the subject of harassment.  Particularly distressing are reports of women seeking fertility assistance who have been harassed when they were mistakenly thought to be seeking pregnancy termination.”
 

It’s important that the ASC is talking about this, though it’s pretty hard not to draw the
conclusion from that last sentence that it’s of less concern to the committee if women seeking
abortions are harassed than, say, women mistaken for those seeking abortion. Way to go to reinforce
abortion stigma ASC!

And here’s what the ASC had to say about Invercargill:

“It has also come to our attention that harassment of medical staff is taking place in Invercargill resulting from services now being offered at Southland Hospital. We are disappointed that this is occurring.”

“Disappointed”! Strong words. Not. And no mention of what the ASC intends to do about
this.

Readers will recall that the seven-year-long Right to Life v ASC case finally ended on 9
August of this year when the Supreme Court dismissed RTL’s appeal. In its decision, the Court ruled
that the ASC did not have the power to scrutinize individual doctors’ decisions regarding approval of
abortion but that the ASC could ask consultants how they were approaching their decision-making in
general. This report is the first comment we’ve had from the ASC on that case, and it writes:

“The Committee notes it already makes regular enquiries of all certifying consultants. At the time of annual reapplication consultants report on qualifications, continuing professional education, peer support, intended years of service and the nature of the practitioner’s practice. Other enquiries will continue to be made as issues arise.”

The ASC is not saying much here, but this seems to suggest that it thinks it’s already doing
what the court said it should do.

The ASC notes the continued downward trend in abortion numbers overall, and points
particularly to the sharpest decline being in child to teenage groups. It expresses concern that there is
no decline in abortions sought by women who have had two or more previous terminations:
“Key to reaching these women will be further increasing the availability of various forms of
long-term contraception as well as increasing access to publicly funded tubal ligation or ablation so
that unwanted pregnancies are avoided. It is concerning to note that the number of publicly funded
tubal ligations performed has been declining.”

Cue the media focus: According to a report in the DomPost, reality TV shows are helping
push a decline in teen pregnancy. The ASC says this is because “extensive reality television
programming depicts the struggle most young people have in attempting to raise a child of their
own…”

It goes on to say, that “the decline is also likely a result of younger New Zealanders
practising safer sex and having less sex overall”. Apparently not watching so much reality TV are
the 20-24 year olds. There’s a new graph this year on “no contraception by age group.” In other
words, what were the ages of the 52% of women who had abortions and said they’d been using no
contraception? According to the report, the biggest group, at 32%, were 20 to 24 year olds; the next
biggest, at 20% each were under-20s and 25-29 year olds.

When it comes to timeliness, Northland and Southland are still coming in last, meaning
women in those districts are accessing abortion care much later than those elsewhere. (The median
gestation in those districts for first trimester abortion is nearly 10 weeks! That is not a good stat, and
that’s the median, meaning access is much later for some women.) Here’s hoping the Invercargill
service will help improve that stat for Southland. But what is going on in Northland?

Finally, there are 170 certifying consultants, down from 175 in the previous year’s report,
and the amount spent on certifying consultants was $4,427,120, also slightly down on the previous
year.

Guestie: The War on Women

Many thanks to Amanda from Pickled Think for submitting this guest post.

Perhaps these fictional examples look like women you know about to be effected by the latest rounds of the War on Women...err...Social Welfare cuts.

• Erin, early 30s, mother of two. Children aged ten and twelve. Has just left an abusive husband of 15 years. No formal education beyond sixth form. Has not worked for almost all of the marriage because husband insisted on controlling finances and did not like Erin "fraternizing" outside of the home. Last job she held was as a "checkout chick" at a local supermarket at age 17. Currently undergoing counselling for domestic violence she suffered. Moving through the court system in a messy divorce and to gain sole custody of children. Children suffering from behavioural problems at home and school because of family violence and divorce, require careful monitoring and CYFs are watching her, making things more stressful. Is often tracked down at a safe place by partner, and driven to further hiding. Cut off from both sets of parents, her siblings and friends because of controlling ex, so cannot count on them for childcare. Cannot afford a car. Cannot get interim education because of Adult Continuing Education cuts. No one wants to hire someone with an empty CV, unreliable transport and unsteady timetable as she moves from one safe house to the next, and struggles to find and afford childcare.
  
  And this woman is to be forced to find a job why?

• Maggie, 55, no children. Husband recently died suddenly, leaving a business, mortgage and health care bills to settle. Has university entrance and a few correspondence papers under her belt, but most of her skills have been gained working for her husband's business and unquantifiable.  Husband's health insurance and superannuation payouts and sale of business (after debtors settled) is enough to pay off outstanding bills and mortgage with a little left over which she wishes to reinvest for her retirement (as she is in good health) rather than use it as living expenses now and suffer a cut back retirement. She could go back to tertiary education, but feels it would cut into the time and money she has left before formal retirement age. Employers are wary of hiring someone of her age and empty CV.
  
  Why would you penalize or completely remove her benefit  simply because she struggles to find a job under the auspices of institutionalized ageism and sexism?

• Moana, 27, married, 3 children under 10. Left school at 15, no formal education, cannot afford any ongoing education. Lives in an historically high unemployment rural area. Husband works a variety of seasonal jobs that takes him away from the home for weeks at a time, which means their income is not always static and they rely on benefits in between times. She has worked a variety of temp jobs deemed as unskilled labour, often just earning minimum wage. Both sets of parents and a variety of friends are available for child care outside of school hours, though her youngest is not yet school age, and these family and friends also work and sometimes are unavailable to help. She cannot afford child care, and CYFs have unusually targeted her, causing undue stress,  though both are good parents and doing their utmost to earn a living. She has unreliable transport, as the car keeps breaking down. In a particularly low time in job availability, she is offered a job in the next town 45 minutes away, but it is only minimum wage, not flexible in the hours she needs to look after her kids, and not worth it for the amount she must spend on petrol and car maintenance.
  
  Should she be penalized and/or lose her benefit because she accurately weighs up the economic and time costs of this job, refuses it, and suffers from entrenched racism?

• Raine, 25, pre-operative transgender woman, single, no dependents. Not in touch with, and can't rely on, any family. Highly educated. Suffers from bad depression. Has lived on the streets before, but currently in a stable, sympathetic living arrangement - would not like to leave if money runs out, but may have no choice. Has worked a variety of well paid jobs, but has been forced to leave many times after being outed against her will and shunned by employees. Would like surgery, but cannot maintain a steady job to afford it as well as her health regimen.  Recently left a sympathetic workplace because of depression issues. Used up all savings towards surgery as living expenses so as not to deal with social welfare system, but now running out of money. Finds sickness benefits excessively difficult and unsympathetic to deal with. Has high medical bills. Can get a benefit, but demands to get another job are stressful as she deals with health care, decision to stay closeted, and living arrangements.
  
  Should she be penalized because of medical issues and systemic transphobia in the workplace and social welfare system?

• Tina, 42, 2 children aged 12 and 14, recently divorced. Lives in Christchurch.  University education. Parents deceased, siblings live overseas. Amicable divorce finalized just before Feb22 earthquake, with agreed joint custody. Children suffering some stress and behavioural issues from earthquake and divorce. Lost her house and job from earthquake. Currently renting while waiting for EQC and insurance payouts on house. Unable to find permanent work post-earthquake because of shrinking local job market, though has taken on some temp jobs. Finds a job in Auckland, but it is far less money than desirable, will take all her savings to move, finances will be in flux while awaiting insurance payouts, after school care for stressed children and living expense will be more expensive, and will take children away from the childcare base of their father who is secure in Christchurch.
  
  And this is an ideal way to "get back into work" how?

• Sharyne, 17, single, no dependents. Living on her own between a variety of friends houses. Sexually abused from a young age by stepfather. Ran away from home at age 14 after failed CYFs placements. Often needs to leave a flatting arrangement quickly if stepfather and associates tracks her down. Left school at age 15 with behavioural issues. Has worked a variety of temporary jobs but left or been fired each time because of altercations with staff or customers. Family and friends who are trying to keep her separated from her abuser, and helping her contemplate laying charges, helping her towards counselling and various work placement courses that may suit her interests, but when she has a relapse or drinking session ends up on the street and/or picked up by the police. Community services keeping an eye on her, but recommends she needs careful attention before she can return to education or work.
  
  Does the government not realize that by taking control of paying a person's rent and living expenses they tie them up in impractical paperwork that slows down their retreat from an abuser? That by forcing a young person towards work or education when they are not mentally or socially capable will cause more problems?

• Robin, 47, single, 1 grown up child who lives overseas. Never married. University education, computer specialist. Suffered a serious back and neck injury twenty years ago, which now creates recurring pain issues and periods of depression. High medical bills. Unable to sit at a computer for long periods of time, though tries a variety of positions/ergonomic furniture to varying success. Some days are better than others with pain management. Reduced mobility with walking stick and scooter, though can look after herself given plenty of time for daily routine. Has tried to work in the past, but met with frustration from employers at her slow movements and high needs. Some success with self employment, but cannot maintain high enough mobility, mental health and energy to self advertise and manage projects.
  
  Should she be tossed out again into an unsympathetic workplace when she knows how this will end, in more stress, pain, and possible loss of already precarious funds?

These examples just scratch the surface of the depth and breadth of women's needs within New Zealand's welfare system. They're not eating bon-bons and watching soaps, waiting for the next sperm donor to turn up so they can rort the system. But thanks Paula and John-John, you two self-declared products of our welfare system, for that nice little mythology you've chucked out there. Nothing like keeping the rich white voters of the country happy with a few little elitist exaggerations.

Bootstraps, eh? Now available in Kiwi Flavour.

Guest Post: The R-Word

Thanks to hazel for allowing to crosspost this from The Money Pit where she blogs about home renovation and her life.


Field and I are in a relationship.

We don’t have sex.

It’s a relationship where we split the bills and squabble over what kind of cheese to buy; where I get away with picking the bacon I want, and she has all the salt-and-vinegar chips her little heart desires; where we have long sprawling conversations at eleven o’clock at night about Books We’ve Read and Why Television Is Hard; where we email each other from our respective workplaces about what we want to eat for dinner, what we’ve read on the internet news that day, why four hours sleep is not enough, whether it’s a good idea to buy more wine (yes). But at the end of the day, we go to our separate beds in our separate rooms and close the doors.

And it’s invisible.

*

A few nights ago we had a conversation about how we want to refer to each other: we flatted with each other (and with Nish) for six years, but this is something new. We’re hiring plumbers now. In the end we decided that “co-owner” fit the best, but that’s not quite right either: too much business in the front, not enough party at the back. “Partners” has connotations that I in no way disapprove of, but which just aren’t accurate; it wouldn’t bother me in the slightest if people thought that Field and I were a couple, but we’re not. I toyed with “lady-wife”, mostly as a joke, but while that kind of shit is fun with friends it’s difficult to say with a straight face to your lawyer, your electrician, your bank-manager, your mum.

So co-owners it is for now, and we’ll change it if it stops being the closest match for what we are.

*

But we’re invisible, this thing. When I talk about buying a house with Field, I’m talking about my long-term life plan. I’m talking about planning a garden, about where we’re planting the fuschia (me) and the hebes (me) and the carpet roses (Field) and the agapanthus (over my dead body). I’m talking about the six-month conversation we’ll have about whether we’re going to wallpaper or paint the lounge, and what shade it should be, and what the curtains should be made of. I’m talking about how we run the kitchen, how we cook together, how we make plans to go to the supermarket and what our budget there will be. I’m in charge – always and forever – of making electronics Go; she’s in charge of the alphabet because my god how I hate reshelving books.

I’m talking about the two or three years of planning that went into this. I’m talking about how I researched suburbs and public transport routes; about how grateful I am that Field got her full licence and a car, and how much easier that made the house-hunting process. I’m talking about the gin-and-tonics she made us tonight for dinner, before she went to lie down on her bed in the summer evening sun and I came online to watch comedy routines on youtube and write this post. I’m talking about the expression of my hopes and dreams, my plans and schemes, how I’ve wanted to do up a house for forever (as long as Nish has known me, and that’s a bloody long time).

I’m talking about how we started having conversations about how we wanted this to work 18 months ago, how we set up a joint savings account over a year ago, how we now have 2 joint accounts plus the mortgage, insurance in both our names and shared household goods. I know where she was born, her date of birth, what her passport photograph looked like when she was thirteen. I chat to her mum sometimes on the phone a bit. She knows these things about me.
And so I have conversations with people about buying a house with Field, and what they hear is of two good friends buying a house together, and what they say is:

That’s sensible.

and

Have you thought about what would happen if you didn’t want to live together anymore?

*

And.

No. No, it isn’t sensible, you utter moron, do you know how much it would devastate me if it all turned to pot, how difficult it would be to disentangle our lives? Our finances are complicated and not wholly governed by standard law, but that’s the least of it when we have mostly shared friends and I can’t remember exactly how to cook dinner on my own anymore, when the kitchen seems strange when she’s not there to navigate around and pass me spoons and pepper.

and

Yes, what, you think we set up a joint savings account and talked to banks and lawyers and looked at houses and put in an offer and went unconditional and settled and moved without ever thinking about what we were doing? Without ever talking to each other about it?

*

This wasn’t an accident, this house in this street. It wasn’t the easy or the simple choice; it wasn’t obvious. It wasn’t a calculated financial decision. My life isn’t good financial planning – single girls without options, women on the shelf looking to get on the property ladder. I may be a spinster with a cat, but by god I have done it with intent.

Guestie: Fab Feb Fasting Feminist Seeks Same

Many thanks to Deborah for this guest post, crossposted at her place and The Lady Garden, seeking some fab feminist friends to fundraise fast with this February.

I'm going to do FebFast 2012, and I'm hoping that some of the fabulous feminists and friends that I know would like to do it too, and join the team I have set up for us.

The idea of FebFast is simple. You give up drinking alcohol for an entire month, and you pay for the privilege of doing so - $25 for people in employment, and $15 for concession card holders and students. That sounds like a dud deal, except that the money raised goes to four organisations, all of whom are working with young people who may be vulnerable to alcohol abuse. The four organisations are: Rainbow Youth, Evolve, CareNZ, and the ADHD Association. You can read more about them here: FebFast: Meet the Recipients.

So... are you prepared to give up alcohol for the month of February? It's a short month, 'though a day longer this year thanks to the leap year. Even if you don't wish to give up alcohol for a month, you might care to make a donation in support of the team, and of course, in support of the four organisations working to help young people who have problems with alcohol.

If you have an event you were planning to go to in February, and have an alcoholic drink or two, you can still do FebFast. You can buy a Get Out of Jail Free card Time Out Certificate for $25 for an emergency, $35 for a big event, or $45 if you're looking to purchase absolution.

Please think about joining the fast, or sponsoring someone who is doing it, or making a donation. And if you're doing any one of those things, how about doing it as part of the Fabulous Feminists and Friends FebFast team? You can join the team as part of the registration process, or if you want to make a donation, you can do it by clicking on the "Donate" button on the team page.

I'm really, really, hoping that I'm not going to be a team of one...

If you want to find out some more about FebFast, there's an article in the New Zealand Herald today: Kiwis challenged to February booze ban.

Guestie: Of cupcakes and feminism

Many thanks to Rachel Rayner for this guest post, resulting from a conversation we were having on twitter about just this very topic.

"Thank you all for coming to this very important feminist debate. We have a panel of female politicians, discussing very important women's issues before the upcoming election. And we made CUPCAKES!"

When did this happen? The cupcake, a symbol of the Sex In The City brand of feminism has been fully embraced by the more sincere, unshaven, blog-reading feminist public. What was once a delight, an excuse to eat calories (calories!) guilt free because it's a cupcake and you deserve it has become a mandatory part of any feminist event.

Part of this is simply good hospitality. Breaking bread with friends is truly a wonderful thing, and a cuppa tea and something sweet makes any event flow more smoothly. The problem is that cupcakes are a faff. They're more labour-intensive than asparagus rolls, and more difficult to transport than biscuits. They're not fairy-cakes, those simple, rock hard little things, smeared with icing and splattered with sprinkles: a cupcake is an immense wodge of cake, topped with a swirl of pastel icing. The icing is sickly sweet, the cake is bland and dry. The paper casing flakes off in skin-like clumps as the still apron-clad baker watches closely. Do you like it? It’s a new recipe. I bought the edible glitter specially.

Cupcakes are representative of privilege in ways that barely need explaining. Even the simplest recipes take hours to pull together, and assumes access to ingredients and money to buy them; some level of skill; tolerance to gluten; and an environment rich with mixing bowls, muffin tins and those little paper cases. While this is arguably a pretty low hurdle (thrifty recipes which don’t call for butter or eggs! No-fail cake mixes! Just buy some damn cupcakes and call it a day!), any privilege creates cliques and excludes those outside it.

There's sometimes a fine line between sincerity and irony. We can ironically embrace cupcakes and high heels and foofy skirts and all the rest - it's when heels become mandatory and cupcakes a chore that it's a problem. Spending hours and hours in the kitchen can be a delight, it’s true, but when cupcakes are baked not out of choice, but to meet the expectations of others, we’ve circled around to a place I thought we’d left behind.

It's the pervasiveness of cupcakes that irritates me. Your discourse is still valid without sprinkles. If baking is your thing, by all means, bake. It can be relaxing, meditative, and delicious baked goods are a wonderfully concrete way to express affection. But let’s leave behind cupcakes for cupcakes sake. Put the jug on, and open a packet of biscuits.

Guest Post: Abortion as Society's Mirror

Many thanks to Alison McCulloch for permission to cross-post her recent guest post at the ALRANZ blog, and my apologies for tardiness.

The discussion sparked by Richard Boock’s blog posts (“A Woman’s Right to Choose” and “Defending Your Right to An Opinion”) got me thinking about the how so many moral debates wind up with abortion as their end point. It’s not breaking news that societies tend to act out so many of their moral fears and panics by restricting sexual expression and reproductive rights. That they use contraception and abortion as tools to try to control what they fear or disapprove of. New Zealand has its own long history of doing this, be it trying to get white women to have children in order to avoid “race suicide” to keeping contraceptive information away from teenagers for fear of runaway teen sex – or something.

In a society that devalues certain groups, like those with Down syndrome or others who don’t fit a particular mold, as ours does, again we find the sharp end of the debate being focused on abortion. As if this, and so many other problems, could be solved if only women would stop having abortions for the “wrong” reasons.

The view of the 1977 Royal Commission report on Contraception, Sterilisation and Abortion, on which our current abortion laws are based, is stuffed full of moral fears and prejudices that quite neatly reflected 1970s society (and, I’d argue, 2011 society, too.) Here, I’ll just offer an excerpt that’s closely related to the issue at hand, from page 200 of the report.

(5) It is not immoral to terminate a pregnancy where the fetus is likely to be born with a severe physical or mental handicap, because the burden of the handicapped person to himself and to his parents may be greater than the sum total of their happiness.

(6) The termination of unborn life for reasons of social convenience is morally wrong.

One could make a good case that (6) and (5) are at odds, that the utilitarian rule used in (5) is completely bizarre and that the use of “fetus” in one case and “unborn life” in the other displays a clear agenda. But aside from all that, look at what this says about societal attitudes.

Then, as now, there’s a desire to condemn abortions that take place for “social convenience” (a nicely loaded phrase the Commission used frequently to conjure up images of women rushing off to the clinic because that pregnancy was going to interfere with their party plans). At the same time, the Commission gave a hearty thumbs up to aborting fetuses that were likely to be a “burden” because society did, and largely still does, both devalue the disabled and approve of such abortions

So the cry goes up: let’s clamp down on the abortions. Let’s ban abortions for X or Y reason to fix X or Y problem. Let’s ban abortions for reasons that we find offensive or trivial or discriminatory or “socially convenient”. That will resolve the difficulty and absolve us. Of course it won’t. Women’s choices cannot but be influenced by the society they live in, the pressures they face, the judgments made by those around them. In a society that devalues women and girls, there’s pressure to abort females, just as in this society, there’s pressure to abort fetuses with certain conditions.

The next step is to make abortion-seeking women (and those who support and facilitate their choice) the culprits for wider society’s perceived failings. It is she who is the root cause of a particular moral problem or a particular group’s being devalued if she has an abortion for the “wrong” reason. It is she who is the cause of promiscuity or moral decline or the breakdown of the family (which hasn’t actually broken down yet). It is she who is the cause of child abuse or our inability to fund superannuation. (A shout-out to Garth George on these last two.)

While we still live under laws that try to pick and choose who should and who should not be able to access abortion care, campaigns to ban abortion for X and Y reason, reflecting X and Y societal failing, will continue. Which is why abortion should be, as of right, up to the individual, its availability not contingent on your having a “worthy” reason, where that reason is dictated and enforced by the state. No, it won’t be a choice made in a vacuum, so campaigns to eliminate, or at least reduce, the kind of pressure to abort that some women say they’ve felt on receiving certain fetal diagnoses, are crucial. Just as important are efforts to stop dumping society’s short-comings at the door of pregnant women and calling them names for choosing to have an abortion.

Abortion restrictions should not be used as a tool to try to deal with wider problems – be they real or imaginary. The social goal might be just, but enforced pregnancy cannot be an answer.

Alison McCulloch is on the National Executive of ALRANZ. The opinions in this post are her own.

Guest post: Why minors deserve a choice as well

By smkreig, cross-posted from The Comfort

As many of you may remember, there was a heated debate earlier in the year about supposed ‘secret’ abortions which were being performed on teenagers without their parents knowledge or consent. There was a public outcry about how schools and heath-care facilities (or in a broader view, the state) were taking the place of parents in helping the minor make the decision of if they should or should not carry the pregnancy to term. Many suggested that the school (or health professional) should have to inform the parents when a minor is considering an abortion.


I don’t understand how these people came to this conclusion. I agree that people should be encouraged to talk to trusted friends and family about their situation - especially if they are finding it overwhelming. A strong support network is important for any teen; but this is where many people missed the point. In suggesting that parents/guardians should be informed when their minor is pregnant and considering an abortion, they also suggest that these parents/guardians are part of a trusted support network for the teen. This is by no means always true. Parents are humans and therefore they can be abusive, coercive or even be the cause of the pregnancy. There is often a reason why a teenager will come to a guidance counsellor, nurse, or doctor in confidence. If the woman trusted her parents and considered them supportive, she would most probably have gone to them for support.

It also suggests that the parents know what is best for the teen and her uterus; and this is where the argument really fails. Some people suggest that it is important to inform the parents because they will also be affected by the pregnancy. No doubt, the parents can choose to help look after the child, they can choose to help fund its upbringing. So why should they not have a say, if THEY want a grandchild? Simply put; their role as grandparents can be abandoned. The fact that the young woman needs to carry the foetus in her uterus; needs to endure pregnancy; needs to make the decision of what to do after it is born: this cannot be abandoned if she is denied the individual choice of abortion. Someone who is not directly, and undeniably affected by the pregnancy cannot claim to know what is best for the woman who is pregnant, becuase they therefore put their preference and morals infront of the health; wellbeing; and autonomy of the woman as a human being.

This post is not about the ‘state raising our children’, it is about considering pregnant teens as self-possessing human beings, who are able to make a decision about their own bodies. If it was required for parents to be allowed to make a decision about their daughter’s foetus, the daughter should also have the choice to pass the obligation of pregnancy onto those who want to keep it.


***


This is part of a week of Pro-Choice Postings hosted here at The Hand Mirror starting on Friday 28th October 2011. For an index of all the posts, being updated as they go up, please check the Pro-Choice Postings index. And if you'd like to submit a post for cross-posting, guest posting or linking to please email thehandmirror@gmail.com.

Guest Post: Hollaback Wellington launches this week!

A guest post from Josephine at the Wellington Young Feminists’ Collective, cross posted on the WYFC blog. Many thanks to WYFC for submitting this.

 The WYFC is launching Hollaback Wellington this week and we’re really excited!

Hollaback was started by a group of people in New York as a website and mobile application to raise awareness of the street harassment many women and LGBTQ folk were experiencing on a daily basis. The idea was so simple but effective that soon Hollaback chapters were being launched across the world, and now we are bringing it to Wellington.

The idea behind Hollaback is that people who experience street harassment need a voice. Hollaback’s aim is to do this through harnessing mobile and web technology, creating a global network of blogs and a mobile apps relating to different countries and cities. All chapters are unique but linked by a common goal - to reduce the amount of street harassment that happens in their city.

Harassment in the home, workplace or at school is widely considered unacceptable but it seems that in our public spaces all bets are off. Street harassment is a form of gender and sexuality based violence that a huge number of people all over the world experience everyday.

Street harassment includes touching, groping, lewd comments, following, flashing, assault and other violent acts. The logistics of reporting these events involves users filling out a form on the Hollaback website, which is then posted by a site administrator to a map of Wellington, showing a red marker where the incident occurred and outlining the story in full. We’re primarily targeting women and LGBTQ people, but anyone who experiences street harassment is welcome to post.

We’re setting this up in Wellington because we felt the need for a service of this kind. My own motivation came from some awful experiences I had at university, where a guy from my maths class decided to start following me around campus, and when he saw me out in public, following me on the street. Not knowing this guy’s name, I couldn’t report him to anyone. What I really wanted to do was tell someone about how his behaviour made me feel: unsafe, alone and disgusting. Hopefully Hollaback Wellington can be some sort of outlet for people who have similar experiences to mine - we want them to know that this is not something you have to brush off or that you have to deal with by yourself.

As we continue to get set up we will promote other organisations that deal with gender based violence, such as HELP Sexual Abuse and Wellington Rape Crisis. We’re also interested in holding self defence workshops, bystander intervention workshops and working with the Council, Students Associations, and engaging with our lawmakers on these issues.

Longer term, we want contribute to making this kind of behaviour socially unacceptable. One of the ways to achieve this is by encouraging people who witness street harassment to speak up. Hollaback International’s most recent fundraising campaign - “I’ve got your back” - raised money so that we can redevelop our blog and mobile app platform to include stories from bystanders who have intervened in street harassment situations. They will be mapped with green marker, and each story will have a button similar to the Facebook ‘Like’ button so that readers can show their solidarity.

Please share this site with your family and friends in Wellington, and contact Hollaback International if you are interested in launching one in your town or city. We’re also having a launch gig at Happy on the 13th, so if you’re in town you should come along.

Loves,

Josephine.