Take the quiz: Who said it?
September 11, 2013
Rapists or Lads’ Mags?
That’s the question.
I have always discussed how degrading and misogynistic magazines like ZOO are to our world and have also let you know that together with my partner in crime, Lily Munroe – with the strong support of Collective Shout and people such as Steve Biddulph – we are close to launching a sister campaign to the UK’s Lose the Lads’ Mags, here in Australia.
These magazines have now crossed the line and I’m over the clichéd arguments: Yes, porn has always existed. Yes, you can see a woman on the beach in a bikini. But my favourite has to be when a man responded to me on Twitter by likening a man with a bare chest on a Men’s Health magazine, as being in the same league of objectification as this:
Snore. These covers are now the gateway to what’s inside because women are not only being exploited and objectified in the images on the covers and on the pages inside – it’s also how women are being talked about. A gentle reminder (which is in the ZOO link above) was when ZOO asked its followers to pick a ‘half’:
But there’s more – there’s violence. Talk of violence against women – in magazines with NO age restrictions. It’s Rape Culture. It’s Porn Culture.
All of our rights are being exploited by having them so readily available.
Psychologists from Middlesex University and the University of Surrey discovered that the line between comments from convicted rapists and ones made in Lads’ Mags, were starting to blur. The following article explains: Are sex offenders and lads’ mags using the same language?
Question #182: So – do you think you can tell the difference?
Let’s see!
Leading up to the launch of our Lose the Lads’ Mags sister campaign in Australia we have compiled our own list of quotes taken from Lads Mags such as Zoo, Maxim, FHM and Picture as well as interviews with convicted rapists.
*** Take the quiz >>> HERE
Please let me know how you fared!
Deep Breath. x
What I don’t get about the fight AGAINST feminism.
April 6, 2013
“When women participate in the economy, in peace-making and peace-keeping, we all benefit. Giving women and girls a fighting chance isn’t a nice thing to do, it’s a core imperative for every society…This truly is the unfinished business of the 21st century, and it is the work we are called to do.” – Hillary Clinton at the Women in the World Summit.
Yes.
It’s not about being nice.
Who made men the boss of us all?
We’re two halves…why is that so hard to fathom?
It’s for EQUALITY for our gender – the other half.
And to be equal exactly as we are – not equal due to being more masculine.
We can’t be more like men, we have to balance out the male characteristics and qualities.
That’s why we’re here. Otherwise it would just be all men.
Who made physical strength THE only trait to be valued as the best?
Because one can physically bully for how they desire things to be?
A woman’s strength is impenetrable.
Just look at what we do and/or survive daily; globally.
Why we don’t use this different type of strength to our advantage, just leaves me gobsmacked. It stamps the stupidity of our species more deeply into our psyche.
We’re in this inequality together, in some form or another.
And regardless of gender, it will most definitely affect someone you love.
It’s moral and ethical cancer – and yet, here we are.
The fight for the right to be richer and more controlling than others, is louder than all of us getting a slice of an equal existence.
I have to believe (and do) that there are more good people out there, than not.
Question #154: So why the fight against this?
Deep, bloody breath.
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A night with Eve Ensler.
February 13, 2012
On a whim, a colleague of mine and I found ourselves getting tickets to see Eve Ensler speak about human rights – more specifically, women’s rights.
She’s an American playwright who most famously wrote, ‘The Vagina Monologues’ but more importantly, she’s an activist for women’s human rights world-wide.
She was introduced as a warrior. How wonderful.
And she was. The horrific statistics and stories that she told about the raping, assaulting, stoning, burning, sex trafficking, genital mutilating and so on, of women around the world, right now, left us stunned – it was like the audience was holding its breath. As I listened, I knew that women were suffering worldwide, but not at this catastrophic level – a place we’ve never been at before. A sense of hopelessness took hold.
Nevertheless, I left inspired and with a fire in my belly – because there was also joy in some of her stories…and FIGHT. *Just look a deep breath*
She talked about having a voice. And that’s the answer. Women need to learn, observe, express and QUESTION the world around them – a world where women are not exploited and are equal in Every. Single. Way.
This is impossible without women using their voice. This blog is my voice.
The icing on the cake, for me, is that Eve’s a playwright, who has seen how healing it is when women watch theatre and learn the wonder of free expression. She inspires women who have been through the unimaginable, to start to create change by saying and doing what they can – to stop it from happening to anybody else. And they succeed.
Eve started V-Day, which is actually tomorrow – Valentines’ Day. V- Day is to finally STOP violence against women. Clink on the link below and join the movement because 1 in 3 women worldwide will be beaten or raped in their lifetime. That’s worldwide and it’s a deeply embedded practice.
http://www.vday.org/onebillionrisingpage.html
This movement also knows that there are countless men, who want to stand together with their daughters, sisters, aunts, mothers and grandmothers and join the ‘choir’.
She also opened ‘The City of Joy’ – a place for countless women to go to, who have been victims of rape in the Republic of Congo.
Eve not only walks the walk, she talks the talk. We need to follow suit.
Eve’s latest book is a collection of stories about young women from around the world. Some are fictitious and others aren’t – but they represent a rainbow of young women. It’s called, ‘I’m an Emotional Creature’ and this is an excerpt from Eve’s introduction:
When I was your age, I didn’t know how to live as an emotional creature. I felt like an alien. I still do a lot of the time. I don’t think it has much to do with the country I grew up in or the language I speak. In this book you will meet girls from everywhere.
Some live in remote villages, others in huge cities or posh suburbs. Some worrying about whether they will be able to afford the latest purple UGGs, some worrying if they’ll ever get home after two years of being held as a sex slave. Some deciding whether they are able to kill a supposed enemy, some on the brink of killing themselves, some desperate for the next meal, some unable to stop starving themselves.
Girls from Cairo, Kwai Yong, Sofia, Ramallah, Bukavu, Narok, Westchester, Jerusalem, Manhattan, Paris. All of them, all of you, live on the planet right now. I think whatever country or town or village you physically live in, you inhabit a similar emotional landscape. You all come from girl land. There you get born with this awakeness, this open-hearted, have to eat it, taste it, know it, defy it.
Then the ‘grown-ups’ come with their rules, their directions. They teach you how to make yourselves less, so everyone feels more comfortable. They teach you not to stand out. They get you to behave.
I am older now. I finally know the difference between pleasing and loving, obeying and respecting. It has taken me so many years to be okay withe being different, with being this alive, this intense. I just don’t want you to have to wait that long.
Love, Eve
Question #14: Are you with me ladies? Do you have something to say?
Questions for Us 