Women in the Front Line of the Army.

Wil Anderson at the Melbourne Comedy Gala '07
(if you don't like swearing I'd give this one a miss)

Making a Change

Saying we are going to change things to make humans everywhere equal is all well and good, but unless we actually get off our bums and actually do something, saying it means nothing.
But how. How are we, as individuals meant to make a change in this world which contains and estimated 6,782,536,522 people? How is one person meant to make the world equal?
My main tip here is, stop discriminating. I know this sounds silly, but it really is the best way to start. It's one of the best ways individuals can make the world a more equal place. Because if you stop discriminating, whats to say other people cannot do it aswell?

Part of the problem is people don't know how unfair the world is to many.
I have found a very interesting site about human rights. This site is called Australian Human Rights Commission. May sound a little boring, but this site is actually very interesting. They are telling what they intend to do to make Australia more equal. At the website they explain all the different types of discrimination and what a different basic human rights. They go into:

• Racial, Age, Sex Discrimination
• Disibility Rights
• Human Rights
• and other things such as these.
  

I strongly recomend a good look. It really opens up eyes to the different kinds of discriminations which the world has. I hadn't even thought of age discrimination.

http://www.humanrights.gov.au/index.htm

They have also made a youtube page. Here is a video of a women who suffered sexual harrasment in the workplace:

Although things like these are all minor changes, we I believe we can make a difference. Candy Whittome, from the Britsh Institute of Human Rights believes we can make a difference also. Visit the link below to see what she has to say about it:
http://www.creativecommunities.org.uk/essays/92.html

But what do you think? Do you think small changes, such as this, mean that we can make a difference? What else can we do?

Let me know.

My friend has started a blog about equality and living called "The Challenge of Living". It is a really good read and she raises some really good points. I strongly suggest you have a read.

Power of Equality - Red Hot Chili Peppers at Woodstock '94

"Blackest anger.Whitest fear.Can you hear me?Am I clear?"

This is a video of the Red Hot Chili Peppers performing the song which was inspiration for this blog. The lyrics to this song are quite powerful.

If you are like me and have had to do a song analysis during high school, you would most probably be quite familiar with the site: songmeanings.net . Here is a link to the page about this song. Link! There you can see the lyrics and possibly discuss what you think the song is about. Although, I find the meaning of this song a little obvious, I still strongly recomend that you have a read.

If you do not like vulagar words, I do not recomend that you watch/listen to it. Otherwise, I encourage you to read listen and comment on what you think.

From Little Things, Big Things Grow.

Aboriginal Rights.
There are so many things that could be said about this issue. However, I have decided to talk about just one, which is when Gough Whitlam gave back land rights to the Gurindji people.

Today I went to the National Portrait Gallery. There they had the image shown above. We were explained the story behind the photograph. The Girindji people fought for 7 or 8 years for the rights to their land. In the mid 1960's Vincent Lingiari lead the 'walk-off' from a cattle station in a fight for simple rights such as adequate wages. Vincent Lingiari inspired the ballad 'From Little Things, Big Things Grow" written by Paul Kelly.

In the photograph above, Gough Whitlam (the current prime minister of the time) is handing dirt to Vincent Lingiari. This is symbolic to Whitlam giving back the land to the Gurindji people.

Although the actual handing over of the land was done about half an hour before this photograph was taken, the photograph still captures a moment towards equality.

I find this image to be quite powerful (when it is framed a little more beautifully than this). I think this was a real step towards equality.

The image really does say it all without having to know the story.

If you want to know more about what has been done for Aboriginal rights over time, I would suggest this site. It's a timeline of reconciliation.

"Artists Against Racism"

Pretty straight forward. There is a group called "Artists Against Racism". The artists range from painters to musicians to photographers. This image caught my eye. I think the message in this image is really quite clear and clever.

Just something to ponder.

They are currently re-modelling the website, but check it out anyway: http://artistsagainstracism.com/index.html

Feminism.

This post is about a postcard which my mum use to have on her wall. I googled the quote on it and found it! Hoorah!

The quote at the bottom says:

""Feminism encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians." - Pat Robertson, US POLITICIAN, 1992."

Mate, that is totally what it does.

From the time I first saw this postcard until present it has made me laugh. At first I thought he was being sarcastic, but after research I found out that this guy was actually for real.

I did an oral on this in year 8, and I find that the impact of this quote is still harsh but quite amusing. For someone to think those sorts of things about women standing up for womens rights.

Its like me saying:

"Boys nights out encourage men to cheat on their wives, eat the family dog, do the washing, convert to scientology and become gay."

There is nothing really wrong with most of these (except cheating on their wives and maybe eating the family dog). All these things are irrelevent to the a 'boys night out'.

Standing up for womens rights DOES NOT mean that women will become lesbians!

The photo on this postcard, however, has used the quote to the advantage of feminism. There are two girls on the postcard who are both in their swimming togs and are having a giggle. This photo is basically saying (in a blatent manner) "Up yours" to Pat Robertson, which I think really is the best way that someone could react to this quote.

The fight for womens equality, I feel, is not really understood by a lot of people, which is demonstrated by Robertson.

A close friend of mine, who is not anti-feminism, once said something which made me realise he really had very limited knowledge about fighting for womens rights.

I have a "Rosie the Riveter" badge on one of my little bags. The badge is from the post war "We can do it!" feminist act. Basically, during WWII women took over mens jobs while they were at war. Once the men returned they expected women to stop these jobs and go back to being house wives. Wrong. So yeah, you get the idea.

If you haven't the poster or badges, they look like this:

Back to my story. I had just bought this badge when my friend was like "Bridget, why did you buy this badge?". So I was like "What do you mean why?". Then he said "It's not even funny!".
At this point I realised he had no idea what the badge was about and thought that it was a joke, but it wasn't funny. HOWEVER, as funny as I found this I was like "It a feminist badge etc so forth..." and he was like "right." He really did just not quite understand the whole concept of why I wanted this little badge.

In my opinion I think the fight for female rights should be more broadly explained so that people know what the myths are with feminism and what it is. Maybe this will help people who think like Robertson to understand feminism.
Although there will always be people who have their negative opinons about women and their rights. Makes me wonder but I suppose thats why we have feminism.

Anyway, thanks for reading my blog.

Taa, Bridget.