Monthly Archives: September 2007

An evening with Louise Nicholas

AN EVENING WITH LOUISE NICHOLAS

Celebrate Louise’s courage, her newly published book LOUISE NICHOLAS: MY
STORY,
and the changes she is bringing about in NZ society.
Louise will be speaking on
TUESDAY 2 OCTOBER 8pm
Dorothy Winstone Theatre, Auckland Girls’ Grammar School, Howe St, off K’ Rd
Tickets $20 waged, $15.00 unwaged from THE WOMEN’S BOOKSHOP, 105 Ponsonby
Rd.
Visa & Mastercard bookings accepted by phone (09)3764399, email
books@womensbookshop.co.nz
or website www.womensbookshop.co.nz
A donation from ticket sales will be made to Rape Crisis and to the Auckland
Sexual Abuse Help Foundation

Love Your Body Day, Aotea Square, October 17

The Eating Difficulties Education Network (EDEN) brings you Love Your Body Day (October 17th)

In the current climate there are very few opportunities to celebrate and appreciate our bodies as they are and to acknowledge the beauty and natural diversity of all body shapes and sizes. Research demonstrates that body satisfaction is a key determinant in healthy self esteem and self worth. Combined with positive body image, body satisfaction helps to protect against the development of eating difficulties.

Celebrating LYBD on October 17th 2007 is a positive, engaging and proactive way to raise awareness of these issues and to promote body satisfaction for all regardless of size and shape.

Help EDEN to create debate and awareness, promote body satisfaction and raise funds for our services for eating difficulties by buying and wearing a Love Your Body Day tshirt. Together we can make a stand against stereotypical images of beauty, celebrate body diversity and extend services for those needing support.

Buy a tshirt now http://www.productville.co.nz/shop/index.php?cPath=97_148

Join us in Aotea Square on Love Your Body Day (Oct 17th) to contribute to our ‘real beauty’ mural. Bring your creativity and make your mark. Wear your LYBD tee to be in to win a spot prize. To find out more about this celebration event visit www.eden.org.nz regularly for updates.

Why Make Your Dreams Weight?

Eating Difficulties Education Network (EDEN)
www.eden.org.nz
1 Garnet Road, Westmere
PO Box 78 005
Auckland 1245
New Zealand
Ph: +64 9 3789039 Fax: +64 9 3789393

Celebrate Love Your Body Day and buy a gorgeous LYBD tshirt. Go to www.eden.org.nz to find out more.

Challenging the Christian Wedding Tradition of Fathers walking the bride down the aisle

The other morning I was watching the Australian morning show and they were conducting a poll on whether  fathers should be the one giving the bride away in traditional Christian weddings…Apparently the debate over this issue has been going on for a while in Sweden…Is it sexist? should mothers have a part in that too? what do you think?

here is a link,

http://manolobrides.com/2006/09/07/down-the-aisle/

Thanks

FORMER POLITICS FEMINIST GRADUATE STUDENT IN THE NEWS

Bay of Plenty Times

PICTURE: MARK McKEOWN: TMAPS co-ordinator Jessica Trask is buried under a pile of paperwork.

Pushing paper instead of helping victims

20.09.2007
By MICHELE McPHERSON
A lack of funding has left the co-ordinator of a family violence programme launched five months ago in Tauranga, desk-bound and struggling to find time to be out in the community.

Less than three weeks after the launch of the Government’s $14 million “Family Violence _ It’s not OK’ campaign, Jessica Trask of the Tauranga Abuse Prevention Strategy said most of her day is spent pushing paper.

A funding shortage has meant 20 hours of administrative support has recently had to be cut leaving Miss Trask to deal with paperwork and phone calls generated by up to 60 family violence callouts each week.

Time spent sourcing funding is now added to the list of tasks.
Her role previously included educating Western Bay residents on domestic violence _ something she now has little time for.

Miss Trask said that while the Government had poured $14 million into the national campaign, encouraging the public to ring in and report family violence, organisations and community groups had not received additional funding to deal with an increasing workload.

“What was 15 per cent of my role before now has become something like 70 per cent of my role and that’s largely paperwork,” said Miss Trask.

The strategy was 18 months in the planning and aims to bring agencies that deal with family violence together to stop families falling through the cracks and to educate the public on domestic violence.

This week marks the strategy’s five-month anniversary_ a lifespan that has proved too short to fully tap into crucial government funding received by similar organisations in Whakatane and Rotorua.

Miss Trask had been hopeful of receiving $80,000 funding from the Te Rito collaborative fund _ established by the Government in 2002 to ensure local agencies could work together to develop family violence prevention strategies in their region.

However, Ministry of Social Development spokeswoman Marti Eller said the strategy was not eligible for the amount granted to similar groups because it was not in existence during the original contestable funding round in 2003.

Conditions of the Te Rito fund stipulate that applications for a second round of funding _ securing $80,000 a year for three years _ were only open to the original applicants.

The strategy, known as TMAPS, lodged an application regardless and was able to secure $25,000 a year from an unspent allocation of the Te Rito fund nationally.

“The fact that the local team have worked hard to find funding for them (and will prioritise them should any further funding free up) is a tribute to what they have established,” said Ms Eller.

Miss Trask said TMAPS was appreciative of ongoing support from local Government funding agents but a lack of prioritisation of the Te Rito Strategy at a higher financial level meant successful community collaborations like TMAPS were under serious threat.

She had hoped Government funding would result in further expansion across the sector.

“It will mean a considerable shortfall and we will need to be looking to the community to help us to continue this,” she said.

“We don’t need a new strategy, the strategy’s been decided. We just need to fund it properly.”

Tauranga Women’s Refuge manager Hazel Hape said TMAPS, which works closely with 18 family violence related organisations in Tauranga, was a good initiative but its longevity was dependent on ongoing Government funding.

TMAPS was exploring other funding avenues.

GLOBAL DAY FOR DARFUR: CELEBRITY WOMEN CALL FOR WORLD LEADERS TO END THE VIOLENCE

Are women united against violence and for peace?

September 17, 2007

LONDON: Women celebrities and activists – including the Australian actor Cate Blanchett, model Elle Macpherson and writer Germaine Greer – have urged world leaders to demand an immediate ceasefire in Sudan’s Darfur region and the swift deployment of an expanded peacekeeping force there.

The women made the statement in an open letter to newspapers around the world on Saturday before the United Nations General Assembly meeting to discuss the crisis this week.

Their letter was also published before street protests in Britain, the US, New Zealand, South Africa and Japan marked Global Day for Darfur yesterday.

Organisers including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Save Darfur Coalition urged protesters to wear blindfolds and to tell world leaders not to “look away now”.

“The crisis in Darfur and eastern Chad remains one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world. The international community must not look the other way as the situation deteriorates,” said the letter by the 26 activists, eight of whom recently travelled to the western region of Sudan.

More than 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million have fled their homes since ethnic African rebels took up arms against the Arab-dominated Sudanese Government in 2003, accusing it of decades of neglect. The Government is accused of retaliating by unleashing a militia of Arab nomads known as the Janjaweed – a charge it denies.

Efforts are under way to speed up the deployment of a 26,000-strong African Union-UN peacekeeping force in Darfur that is to replace a smaller, ineffectual mission of African Union troops.

The letter urged politicians meeting at the UN to “move beyond sympathy for the suffering” and to “step up the pressure on all parties in the conflict to agree to an immediate ceasefire”.

Other signatories included the US actor Mia Farrow; Dame Anita Roddick, the Body Shop founder who died in England last week, and the Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

Associated Press

WANT TO BE A LAWYER? GENDER IMBALANCE BITES IN NZ LAW

Thinking of becoming a lawyer in NZ? Are you a woman? Don’t count on becoming a partner in a law firm any time soon — or even in your career at all!

Deborah Hollings, feminist and Auckland QC barrister reports in the latest NZ Law Society’s magainze that “women barristers are poorly represented in top legal appointments, despite increasing numbers in the profession”. While Dame Sian Elias holds the loftly position of Chief Justice, figures show few women following in her footsteps. WOMEN ARE HITTING A CONCRETE CEILING IN THEIR LEGAL CAREERS AND URGENT ACTION IS NEEDED TO REDRESS GENDER IMBALANCE AT SENIOR LEVELS OF THE JUDICIARY.

“There are 1319 barristers sole practising in NZ. Of those 36% are women. Including the most recent round of appointments, there are 78 MEN practising at the elite level as a Queen’s Counsel (QC) but only 11 WOMEN! Only 19% of partners in law firms are women.

Hollings go on to report: “there are few women involved in big appellate or commercial cases and if they are, they rarely have “speaking parts” and “are destined to be juniors for the rest of their lives”.

Change is slow in coming…”Part of the problem is the CULTURE OF THE BAR”. “Any professional group that for 700 years has comprised solely men, is bound to have inherited attitudes that may seem unwelcoming to some different entrants. Instances of stereotyping, prejudice, harrassment and “plain unfairness” did little credit lawyers who ghad such an influential role in society”.

UNFAIRNESS,UNEQUAL OPPORTUNITIES, STEREOTYPING AND DISCRIMINATION — BUT THIS IS THE LAW PROFESSION? DON’T THEY KNOW BETTER?

Want to know some of the recommendations to change this situation – or at least this report on the report www.stuff.co.nz/4185336a11.html

DO YOU EXPECT A CONCRETE CEILING IN THE CAREER YOU HAVE CHOSEN OR ARE CHOOSING?

– Jacqui