In The Gateaux

Let's talk about language

2011-04-06T14:00:00.003+12:00

Looking through my Facebook feed, I spied this article that one of my friends had posted.

MORE than seven years after committing a ''disgusting and abhorrent'' crime that appeared to have ended a career that showed its promise when he became the Warriors' youngest ever first-grade player, Shaun Metcalf has been given a second chance.

According to author Celia Lashie his second chance is well deserved and that critics of Metcalf shouldn’t get caught up with the details of his past:

''We can all get caught up in the emotional image of young men booting a young woman in the stomach to cause her to abort her baby, but these were two young people … she got pregnant, he was way out of his depth, and he did a really cruel and dumb thing.

''We can all get caught up in the emotional image of young men booting a young woman in the stomach to cause her to abort her baby” – Excuse me? “Of course it is an emotional image – if the story of a young man, who coldly calculated a plan to force his girlfriend to miscarry by punching and kicking her in her stomach doesn’t evoke some sort of emotional response then what kind of person are you?

“She got pregnant” – Because women just click their fingers and ‘get pregnant’ right? Last time I checked it took two people to make a baby, but maybe Lashie needs to go back to Year 7 Health classes. Also love the implication that her pregnancy somehow contributed to him assaulting her.

“He was way out his depth” - Last time I checked, that wasn’t really an excuse for physically assaulting someone.

“and he did a really cruel and dumb thing.” Well, Lashie got one thing right. It was cruel. I don’t think it was dumb though. Dumb is forgetting someone’s birthday, or trying to start your car when it’s not in park. Metcalf’s actions were cold and calculated.

I don’t know how remorseful Metcalf is about his actions, and how he has come to terms with the vicious assault he carried out. Hopefully he has acknowledged the hurt and the pain he has caused and doesn’t expect people to forget what he has done. What isn’t helpful in the rehabilitation process is people like Lashie making excuses for his actions and trivialising his actions.

Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)

2011-04-04T14:00:00.009+12:00

Unless you’ve been living under an extremely large rock for an extended period of time, you’ll be aware that there is an Important Wedding coming up. Apparently, two students at a University in Scotland meet during the course of their studies, fell in love, and eventually got engaged after many years of being in a relationship with each other. Such a narrative would seem rather mundane, had one of the parties in this relationship not been a future King of England.

Given the amount of attention given to the impending nuptials, it’s easy to understand why some people are a little bit over it all. I’m personally quite ambivalent about the whole thing. There is one thing about the coverage that is getting on my nerves.

“Last week, she [Kate Middleton] celebrated her final days as a single girl with a hen do that was more of a hen don’t: just her, her little sister, and a couple of mates at the home of a close friend."
- www.telegraph.co.uk

“The 28-year-old, who marries long-term girlfriend Kate Middleton at Westminster Abbey on April 29, reportedly marked the end of his life as a single man with a low-key party at a rural retreat at the weekend.”
- www.nz.news.yahoo.com

These are just a few examples. If you search google you can find many more.

I’m quite confused. I was under the impression that both Kate Middleton and Prince William were ‘off the market’ as it were, years ago. I certainly wouldn’t describe two people who have been in a long term relationship as ‘single’. How utterly bizarre.

This is not just one-off language that is being used in relation to the Royal Wedding, it’s the way we tend to talk the nuptials of ordinary people.

Implicit in this type of language is that being married is the only legitimate form of a committed relationship. What this language is really implying is that, despite being in a committed relationship, you’re still not quite there. It’s not quite a real and bonafide relationship unless you put a ring on it.

This attitude’s not just offensive to couples who choose not to get married, but also to gay couples who so far do not have the ability to get married in New Zealand.

Given the diversity of people in general, it’s a little absurd to think we’d all have the same preference for the way in which we choose (or not choose) to label our relationships with one another.

The Great Mansplainer

2011-03-23T13:30:00.027+13:00

In 2008, Chris Trotter wrote a piece describing some of the conservative forces behind the National Party. He described how the anti-abortion movement would be relishing the prospect of a National Government:

“Why? Because behind National, hidden by all those glossy placards depicting the handsome John Key, marches a much less appealing army of fanatical right-wing activists, all of whom are impatient to advance the conservative causes that nine years of Labour-led government have held in check.”

In the piece, he spoke directly to all the ”young, confident women” who according to him apparently view the slogan - “a women’s right to choose” as “antique as the militant suffragettes” cry of "Votes for Women". He sternly advised these young confident women of the 21st century that we all needed to “urgently needs to pause and reflect upon what is happening”.

Thanks Chris. As a member of your so called group of young, confident women I really enjoy you speaking on my behalf. I like how you assume how we might view the past struggles of women in the pro-choice movement. I also appreciate your advice on the need to reflect. Because, as a young confident woman, I haven’t thought about the issue at all!

Thanks for helping make a generation of young women who care about feminist issues completely invisible. If you had any brains you might have taken to the internet to seek out these young women. You might have found a variety of feminists and blogs written by women who passionately cared about reproductive rights. Had you looked, you might have found many women who were willing to discuss the issue, and take action on it.

Of course, you didn’t. Had you actually looked you might have seen the start of a fledgling reproductive rights movement that has begun on the internet and moved onto the streets.

In many ways these bloggers are doing exactly what you so patronisingly advised us to do: ”urgently reflect upon what’s happening”. Yet, according to you, we’re not doing it right.
Thanks for the mansplanation Chris.

Unfortunately for you, if you’re not prepared to engage in the movement in any meaningful way, we don’t really have to listen to you. You haven’t made any attempt to understand the experiences of young women today living in New Zealand. In fact you’ve told us on occasions that we’re not real feminists.

When Kate Sheppard didn’t succeed the first time, she didn’t apologise to the political establishment and move on. She kept on organising. The right to vote wasn’t “just granted” by the politicians of the day feeling particularly generous. It was won through a hard-fought and long campaign.

And you know what Chris? The struggle for reproductive rights in New Zealand will be the same. It won’t be easy, but it was never going to be easy. It’s going to require an enormous amount of work, not just convincing politicians to take up the issue, but challenging the many myths surrounding abortion and reproductive rights access in New Zealand. We all know this.

But we will never change the law if we listen to old men - men like Chris, who will never get pregnant, who assume they understand our experiences as young women, and -most importantly - we’re not going to listen to someone thinks by some divine right that they can tell us how to run our movement. We won't be waiting to be given power. We're just going take it ourselves.

Planned Parenthood Debate

2011-02-20T15:00:00.000+13:00

Take a look at this great speech by Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI) during a House session debate on the Pence Amendment. The amendment proposes to remove funding to planned parenthood. I've copy/pasted the transcript below. It's a very powerful speech.

"I would plead with my colleagues to reject the Pence Amendment and not to defund Planned Parenthood. And I mean that as a double entendre to not defund the ability of women to plan parenthood.

I know of what the previous speaker, the gentleman, referred, to all those well-meaning people who want to speak about the value of life and not fund contraceptives and not make abortion, which is the law of the land, available if people chose that: I am really touched by the passion of the opposite, to want to save black babies. I can tell you I know a lot about having black babies. I've had three of them. And I had my first one when I was 18 years old--at the ripe old age of 18, an unplanned pregnancy.

I just want to tell you what it's like not to have planned parenthood. ... You have to give your kids ramen noodles at the end of the month to fill up their little bellies so they won't cry. You have to give them mayonnaise sandwiches. They get very few fruits and vegetables because they're expensive. It subjects children to low educational attainment because of the ravages of poverty.

You know one of the biggest problems that school districts have in educating some of these poor black children who are unplanned is that they're mobile. They're constantly moving because they can't pay the rent. And yes, I heard some of you talk about sexual predators. It subjects them to sexual predators as when you try to go out and do a little work you have to leave your kids with just anybody because you don't have $800 to $1,200 a month for childcare. And let me tell you, you know the public policy has treated poor children and women who have not had the benefit of planned parenthood with utter contempt.

These same children--it's been very difficult to get them health insurance through CHIPS. When you got to the grocery store to get them a little birthday cake with your food stamps, everyone stares with you in contempt. And yes, on a bipartisan basis, Democrats and Republicans ended the entitlement Aid to Families with Dependent Children. So when we have a recession like we have now, women who are alone typically, poor, of color, with these poor black children have no money, go months and months and months with little or nothing to sustain themselves.

And you know, I remember that the first item on the You Cut website was to cut Temporary Assistance to Needy Families. And let me tell you what it does to women who cannot plan their parenthood: It derails their ability to complete education and training so they can get a job. The TANF is very harsh. It won't even let women complete high school diplomas. It sends them into workfare programs in very low wage service industries, often in jobs without unemployment benefits, and of course they're treated with contempt and disdain when they apply for any aid. They're humiliated. And so I would beg my colleagues, I would beg them to not defund Planned Parenthood. Planned parenthood is healthy for women, it's healthy for children and it's healthy for our society."

Not getting it

2011-02-20T10:41:00.000+13:00

This guy gets it.

When Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shot by Jared Lee Loughner, some commentators noted that while Loughner himself made the ultimate decision shoot Giffords and others who were attending the same event, he did not do so in a vacuum. They noted the sheer toxicity of the society, in which prominent politicians, media types and other public figures tacitly endorsed violence, may have led Loughner to view his actions as legitimate and acceptable.

I’ve always thought that such an analysis can also be used to understand why we live in a society in which violence against women is such a common thing. When you have competitions in which you can ‘win a wife’ and the promotion of such a competition has a woman, face pixelated with a gift tag on ribbon attached to signify her object status, it’s easy to see how such violence against women continues to be a problem. When a person becomes an object, it is easier to disregard their feelings, their emotions and their thoughts.

It’s the type of culture that deems it acceptable to shout at women during cricket matches “tits out for the boys’, or to yell obscenities at women out of cars driving along, or to grope women in buses and trains. For white, heterosexual, able bodied men, such experiences are totally alien. Not on their radar. Hence why men like Martin Sneddon and David Farrar can so easily brush off the concerns that violence against women will increase during the Rugby World Cup and why the idea of subsidised taxi fares, or women’s only spaces seem so absurd.

In a great display of just not getting it Farrar says:

“it is true that there are some studies that suggest an increase in domestic violence after a rugby loss. But the violence does not happen at the rugby grounds – it occurs in pubs and bars or at homes. So the so called solution (sic) of “women-only” space at RWC games is stupid – plus of course would make us look an international laughing stock.”

Actually, it’s not just about the violence that happens. It’s also about creating spaces in which women don’t have to fear violence, regardless of the chance of violence happening. For instance, I know for a fact that as a woman, I’m much more likely to be assaulted by someone I know. It doesn’t stop me from feeling unsafe when I have to walk home at night however and restricts my ability to walk freely.

Dismissing the legitimate concerns around violence during the RWC only serves to perpetuate and support the type of attitudes that lead to violence against women.

Debating third wave feminism

2011-02-15T19:08:00.002+13:00

I’ve mentioned a few times on this blog that I wrote a dissertation last year that dealt with certain strands of third wave feminism. Third wave feminism by in large is a pretty broad label to give to a ‘wave’ of feminist activism and thought that emerged from the 1990s onwards. In some ways, third wave feminism is very confrontational – it has challenged second wave feminism – not only in theory, but also in the modes of organising and the very definition of feminism itself. There is also considerable disagreement between the feminisms that make up Third Wave Feminism.

Thus, from an academic point of view, I was very intrigued by the debate that emerged on the Hand Mirror today, as well as on Young Wellington Feminist Collective Facebook and also the personal blogs of members of the Young Wellington Feminist Collective. For me, it represents one of the tensions inherent in third wave feminism – the need to bring feminism down from the ivory tower of academic feminism and to spread it to the masses in an accessible, fun and dare I say, sexy way. Yet at the same time, there is also the need to engage and debate the meaning of feminism and the appropriateness of particular ways of organising.

Although I’m not a member of the YWFC (although I do ‘like’; it on facebook), I do know a number of the members and the organisations blog is one of must visit blogs each morning. In saying that, I don’t have first-hand experience of the organisation. From what I can tell though is that the organisation is generally awesome. I think it plays an important role in making feminism accessible and relevant to a wider audience who may have not seen feminism as legitimate political perspective before. In many ways, YWFC seems to embody many third wave principles.

As I said before, not all the feminisms in the Third Wave agree with each other – you only have to look to the countless feminist blogs to see some of the friction between the third wavers. A lecture once said that during a gender studies class that all the ‘feminisms’ should metaphorically live in one big house of feminism, but have separate rooms divided by rice paper. That way, people could still have their own space, but they wouldn’t be divided enough that they wouldn’t be able to still engage with each other. It’s a nice analogy.

This analogy explains why to me, if you are going to establish a feminist organisation, you have to be prepared to be challenged regarding its feminist principles. At the very heart of the rice paper walls analogy is the importance of debate and the importance of this debate, in enabling organisations to develop their own feminist stances and beliefs. The feminist movement never moved forward because people shied away from debate, it moved forward because people vocally and loudly, and even sometimes in abrasive ways, challenged society and the movement itself. From a personal example, I might not be a feminist today (although I’d like to think I would be) if someone hadn’t challenged me on my previous beliefs – I used to say “I’m not a feminist, I’m a humanist. I think everyone should have rights!”. People challenging me on my own views has enabled me to develop what I think feminism is, and how I practice it.

I haven’t quite figured out my position on the post at the Hand Mirror – I think one of the comments written by Alison best describe my thoughts at the moment. I think the point that I’m really trying to get at is that if you are going to create a feminist group that is open to the public, you need to be able to rise to the challenges that people will inevitably throw at you. Sure, it might not feel like a whole load of love is being thrown around, but a political movement (even the social aspects) aren’t always going to be a love fest, especially a movement like feminism where it is inherently so personal.

Sunday and Monday Outrage

2011-01-18T16:00:00.001+13:00

Sometimes I think Facebook should create a special 'posting' function for me. Instead of the usual 'what's on your mind?' question, it should also include a second option: 'what are you outraged about today?'. Such a option is desperately needed after reading the New Zealand Herald on Sunday and Monday.

The first example of outrage was on Sunday Morning, when I opened up my laptop to check the news. Are Kiwi male vulgar? the Herald on Sunday asked. Groaning inwardly I could sense that the article would be outrageously sexist, but I clicked anyway. I must by a sadist. I wasn't disappointed.

I'm used to the usual arguments put forward by douche bags when it comes to sexual harassment. Take the Lara Bingle photo scandal - she had revealing photographs taken for magazines before, therefore, she shouldn't be upset by other revealing photos taken of her (without her consent).

But I was absolutely shocked by the total douchebaggary of Ian Long, the spokesperson for Tourism New Zealand.

You see, Anna Faris (from Scary Movie fame) didn't have a great time in NZ:

Appearing on American television to promote the movie, the 34-year-old said Kiwi men had shouted obscenities at her in public and demanded she show them her breasts.

Tourism New Zealand, clearly freaking out about this, respond in the most bizarre way:

But Tourism NZ spokesman Ian Long said no one would take Faris seriously.

"In the same segment, she accepts an award for being a pothead stoner of the year and she's quite clearly had a few. I don't think she has any credibility," he said.

Ladies. It appears that we've moved on from Lara Bingle territory. We can't point out sexual harassment and make a joke a minute later, or have fun. That wouldn't be acting like a proper sexual harassment victim!

I also love the way Long dismisses her point completely. As if street sexual harassment doesn't happen in New Zealand.

On Monday morning, having spent a large chunk of Sunday being annoyed about the article, I get sent this lovely article from the New Zealand Herald - Sharapova's value made a mockery of equal pay claims.

From the first sentence, I knew that the article would offend my feminist sensibilities:

Women don't deserve equal prize money in tennis.

It gets better:

The men's matches are longer, of a higher standard and attract a bigger audience. Quite simply, the men are cheated out of a deserved greater share of the prize pool.

Sigh. I just don't know where to start.

This morning was much better. Very happy to read in the NZ Herald about the Labour Party's plan to extend paid parental leave.

On a completely different note, you should read this article in the New York Times - Darkness on the Edge of the Universe

If astronomers in the far future have records handed down from our era, attesting to an expanding cosmos filled with galaxies, they will face a peculiar choice: Should they believe “primitive” knowledge that speaks of a cosmos very much at odds with what anyone has seen for billions and billions of years? Or should they focus on their own observations and valiantly seek explanations for an island universe containing a small cluster of galaxies floating within an unchanging sea of darkness — a conception of the cosmos that we know definitively to be wrong?

So cool.

Lemon Lamingtons

2011-01-06T08:00:00.000+13:00

I was never a big fan of lamingtons when I was young - I associated them with kitch pastry food that you got from the corner bakery store that used to sell other kitchy New Zealand pastry products. When I think back, it was probably a case of cultural cringe - I was more of a croissants and french pastry fan.

Fortunately, I rediscovered a love for lamingtons. Kind of. My favourite fruit is a lemon, so when I discovered a recipe for lemon lamingtons it upgraded the humble lamington in my eyes.

They are so easy to make! People often think of lamingtons as fairly difficult to make - mainly because making sponge cake is almost an art form. This recipe below is a bit of a cheat’s method because you buy the sponge cake beforehand but make the lemon curd yourself.

My flatmate’s friend made these for her birthday part on New Years day, but she bought store bought lemon curd and watered it down a bit with boiling water which also worked. I prefer to make my own lemon curd – especially as you tend not to use it all so you can use it on toast the next morning. If you’re rushed however, I would recommend using store bought lemonade.

To make these delightful afternoon tea treats here is the recipe that I use.

Lemon Lamingtons

Ingredients

One premade rectangle sponge cake (buy these from the supermarket in the cake section)

4 lemons

1 1/3 c sugar

170g unsalted butter, cubed

5 eggs, lightly whisked

2 cups of dessicated coconut

Method

1. Cut your sponge cake into 15 square pieces and then carefully slice off the brown outer edge. Leave aside. It's important you do this step first as it enables the sponge to develop an ever so slight hardness which makes it easier to dip into the lemon curd.

Sponge cake cut up.

2. Wash and dry the lemons Finely grate and juice the lemons. You will need 2/3 cup of lemon juice.

3. Strain the lemon juice into a medium heavy-based saucepan. Add the lemon rind, sugar and butter and stir over a low heat for about 5 minutes or until the sugar dissolves and the butter has melted.

Melting the butter.

4. Remove the saucepan from the heat and slowly beat in the whisked eggs with a wooden spoon. Return to a low heat and cook, stirring continuously, for 20 minutes or until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of the spoon. Do not allow the mixture to boil or the eggs will curdle. Take off heat when done.

Thickening the lemon curd.

5. Lay out a baking tray with baking paper and scatter about a quarter of the dessicated coconut on the tray.

6. With tongs, dip each sponge square into the lemon curd and then roll it ever so gently on the coconut, ensuring that you keep the sponge intact and the lemon curd doesn't come off. Once you've done this, put the final lamington on a plate and repeat with the rest of the sponge squares.

7. To add some final touches, I like to whip up some cream with some lemon zest and but a sploge on top of each lamington, top off with a sprinkly of lemon zest. You could also do jam and cream or anything that tastes good with lemon.

Last year, my mother invited me to a family friend’s place for afternoon tea. For some bizarre reason, it turned into a mother- daughter bake off. I made the above lemon lamingtons, and she made lime lamingtons.* I’m pretty sure I won.

My lemon lamingtons.

My mum's lime lamingtons.

*She also used a different recipe - using lime jelly. Crazy!

2011-01-05T15:36:00.000+13:00

Go Caitlin!

Caitlin Dunham, the National Women's Rights Officer at NZUSA (a role I held for half of last year) has put out a press release condemning the recent post that ACT on Campus had on their facebook page.

“These comments are deplorable. The fact that they continue to defend highlighting this analogy shows how little they understand of rape culture in New Zealand.” says Caitlin Dunham, National Women’s Rights Officer for the New Zealand Union of Students’ Associations

“The irony is that the student Associations the Act Party Bill targets are the same associations who work tirelessly with students and the community to provide a number of services to those affected by rape, harassment, sexual assault and violence. These include campaigns such as ‘Thursdays in Black’ and ‘Reclaim the Night’, along with safety schemes such as ‘Campus Angels’,” says Dunham.

“We call on the Act Party leadership to condemn these comments highlighted by Act on Campus. Act on Campus need to think twice before comparing their experience as members of student associations to the traumatizing experience of sexual assault. Such thinking further tarnishes the reputation of the Act Party, and provides yet another reason why this Act Party Bill should be voted down by Parliament,” concludes Dunham.

The part that grinds my gears the most is not just the fact that they keep on trying to justify it - but the sheer offensiveness of the post itself and the complete trivialisation of rape and sexual assault and their inability to understand this. ACT on Campus need to get a grip.

On another note - this topic totally demands a privilege denying dude picture. Needz captionz.

How to be super offensive

2011-01-03T22:52:00.000+13:00

Trigger warning.

Because gang rape is TOTALLY the same as universal student association membership. How absolutely sickening.

There is still work to do

2010-12-17T16:04:00.002+13:00

This piece over at Tiger Beatdown is probably the best piece I've read in recent days regarding the whole Wikileaks/Assange issue.

Meanwhile, here are some facts: A man has been accused of rape by two separate women. He fled the country in which he was accused. He is fighting extradition, so that he won’t have to go back to that country and face charges — even though there are spectacularly low rates of conviction for accused rapists, he just doesn’t think that he should have to go through the system, for whatever reason. And you know who’s posting bail for him?

Fucking progressives.

One of the things that has become abundantly clear throughout this case is how totally entrenched we are in rape culture. So much so that when we're presented with a situation like the Julian Assange case we feel we have to take sides - there is no in between. In doing so, we further reinforce the rape myths - "Assange can't possibly be guilty of sexual assault - he's the good guy!" We forget that that this is a false dichotomy. People who do good things, can also do very bad things.

It's a timely reminder for those in the progressive movement that there is still work to do in educating our fellow activists on the subject of sexual violence.

Back in business

2010-11-30T16:00:00.001+13:00

I've been taking a bit of a break from blogging while I've been completing my dissertation. It's all done now - so expect many more posts about stuff.

On Cake

2010-11-01T17:03:00.002+13:00

"Cakes have gotten a bad rap. People equate virtue with turning down dessert. There is always one person at the table who holds up her hand when I serve cake. No, really, I couldn't, she says, and then gives her flat stomach a consipiratorial little pat. Everyone who is pressing a fork into the first tender layer looks at the person who declined the plat, and they all think, That person is better than I am. That person has discipline. But that isn't a person with discipline, that is a person who has completely lost touch with joy. A slice of cake never made anybody fat. You don't eat the whole cake. You don't eat a cake everyday of your life. You take a cake when it is offered because the cake is delicious. You have a slice of cake and what it reminds you of is someplace that's safe. uncomplicated, without stress. A cake is a party, a birthday, a wedding. A cake is what's served on the happiest days of your life."

Quote from Eat Cake by Jeanne Ray

It's not hard to apologise

2010-10-07T22:13:00.000+13:00

There has been a lot that has been written on the blogosphere and various social networking sites about the whole Paul Henry fiasco. It’s almost becoming over kill. One blog post I particularly liked though was Julie’s deconstruction of the various defences of Paul Henry’s comments. Specifically, it got me thinking about the whole subject of how people apologize.

It always seems the case, particularly with Paul Henry-type comments, that there is always an invariable half way apology after the comments have been made. It’s usually something like, “I’m sorry that you took offence at something I said. I certainly didn't set out to cause you to be offended.”

It’s so bullshit.

On my way to work tomorrow, I could be driving along and accidently hit a cyclist causing him/her harm. I wouldn’t then, get out of the car and explain to them that they shouldn’t be upset, because I didn’t intend to hit them with my car. I wouldn’t just apologise for the fact that they have been harmed. I would apologise for the fact that my actions, whether or not I intended them too, caused them harm.*

There seems to be some sort of difference though if you hurt someone in a verbal manner. Suddenly, they are the ones responsible for the hurt and anger that your comments have caused. Suddenly, you’re told that if you’re offended, that you need to “harden up”.

There also seems to be different standards when it comes to things that hurt, that aren’t physical. It would be poor taste to tell someone whose family member had just died that they should control themselves and their emotions. As a society we accept that things like the feelings of grief and sadness are perfectly rational responses to the loss of someone close to them.

Perhaps it’s because most people have experienced the type of hurt and pain that comes with grief. Most people understand because they have felt it before.

The fact that racist, sexist, homophobic and various other prejudiced comments are not taken seriously reflects the privileged perspectives that most people hold in New Zealand. Most pakeha have never experienced the type of racism that comes with having a skin colour that is not white. They won’t have ever had to deal with racial slurs hurled at them for people driving past them or people mocking their cultural practices.

Everyday, being 'pakeha' is considered the norm. The closest thing we have to the deconstruction of whiteness in popular culture is Stuff White People Like.

It’s easy to see why if you haven’t ever experienced any of the above why it would be difficult to for some people to understand how hurtful prejudicial comments can be.

So maybe, when someone tells you what you’ve said is offensive or hurtful - believe them. It doesn’t actually matter if you don’t understand why, or if you didn’t intend to offend. What matters is that you DID upset that person and you need to take responsibility. Last time I checked it wasn’t super difficult to be nice and respectful to other people.

And if you really can’t get to grips with that, the internet has the answer.

*I also want to say that I would do a lot more than just apologise. :)

The second sex

2010-10-06T11:25:00.000+13:00

I’ve taken a step back from being involved in anything political this year. I’ve done the odd leafleting job but other than that, I’ve been focusing on getting my dissertation done. In a way, it’s been rather liberating – I’ve been able to get involved in activities that I haven’t had time for in the last few years. It’s also been helpful in stepping back from things and looking at them from a different angle.

It’s not unknown that the Labour Party seems to be on some sort of masculine drive at the moment. There seems to be some acceptance around the idea that voters were turned off Labour in 2008 because it became increasingly ‘feminised’. Personally, I don’t agree with this assessment. I think there were a range of reasons why people didn’t vote for Labour, not some single over arching factor.

Along with this view, there also seems to be an assumption that the Labour Party is a natural home for female voters and that the party just needs to get the “Waitakere Man” vote back.

I think it’s a dangerous assumption to make and takes a section of the voter population for granted.

The reason why the Labour Party has done well in the past with women voters, is not just that it implemented (some) policies that were friendly to women , but it also reflected that it took women seriously by placing them in positions of leadership within the party.

Looking at the safe seat selections, male candidates have replaced female MPs (Mt Albert and Mana). The sole exception seems to be Wigram with Megan Woods wining the selection there. Then there are also other safe seats that have been held by male MPs that have been replaced by a male candidate– Dunedin North for instance. Furthermore, it seems the more marginal a seat, the more likely it is a women will be the candidate. I don’t want to begrudge on these MPs and candidates. They are all well qualified for the job, but there are equally, just as many qualified women who could have won those seats as well.

Te Atatu is coming up for selection, but I fear that yet again, we will have lost an opportunity.

Some people might say that women just don’t want to stand. I believe it’s much broader than that. I wouldn’t be surprised that the reason is something to do with the current environment in the party being somewhat alienating. People aren’t going to stand for a party in which they do not feel welcome. It’s not just alienating to women, but also to anyone who doesn’t fit into the white, straight, able-bodied, etc etc male paradigm.

It’s also a problem long term. If the party isn’t going to make an investment now in getting women into leadership positions, the party will suffer electorally later. That won’t be good for anyone.

Sadly, this increased masculinisation drive at the expense of everything else makes me question the very party in which I learnt some of my feminist values.

Is 'conservative feminism' an oxymoron?

2010-09-19T21:36:00.001+12:00

Check out this video - It's called "Fire from the Heartland: The Reawakening of Conservative Women"

Fire From The Heartland from Citizens United on Vimeo.

The appropriation of feminist language by conservative right wing women is something that really bothers me. It is particularly evident in the United States. The scary thing about many of these women (Sarah Palin, Christine O'Donnell) is that they also support policies that are anti-women. Many of these women are so pro-life that they don't support abortion even in cases of rape and incest.

Two things I would like very much

2010-09-16T21:32:00.001+12:00

At the moment, there are two things that I feel would make my life nearly complete.

I've been avidly following this blog recently. Basically, this woman in the United States has collected up 365 dresses from Op Shops that all cost $1. She's then upgrading them into new clothes by taking off sleeves, cinching in the waste and adding a few brooches. It inspired me to head down to the Salvation Army Family Store today at lunch where I ended up with a lovely blue and white polka dot number. I'm going to cut off the sleeves, get rid of the collar and sew an elastic band into the inside of the dress. I have a little bit of sewing knowledge thanks to my mother so hopefully it won't be a total disaster and I'll have a brand new dress! I don't especially want a hello kitty sewing machine though.

I've starting doing roller derby training and I'm really really enjoying it. There is something about learning a new skill that gives you such a buzz - every time I go to training I feel like I'm picking up something new, or I finally 'getting' a particular technique. It is a good feeling. The only downside is that I have to use the skates from the skate rink. They're ok at the moment for training, but I would kill to have a pair to myself. There is something confidence boosting about having your own shiny pair of new skates.

All I need to do now is win lotto.

If I had a hammer, I'd smash the Kyriarchy

2010-09-13T20:50:00.000+12:00

I saw this piece on the Guardian last week and it took me some time to digest.

What is "The Kyriachy"? (Can someone also tell me how to pronounce it please?)

So, kyriarchy: the substitution of one elitist, etymological hair-splitting term for another, I hear my newly estranged sisters cry – just what feminism needs. But this is a neologism with a difference. Where patriarchy – literally, rule of the father – explains only how traditional male authority dictates to, and subjugates women, kyriarchy (from the Greek: kyrios – lord/master; archion – dominion/rule) relates how each of us, whatever our gender, is a bundle of privileges we can all too readily abuse by invoking the "master power", whether that's as a black female barrister, a mixed-race trans male teacher, or a white immigrant male labourer. At the same time, the term's connotations of elite authority perfectly tap into the legacy of oppression that western feminists, from Mary Wollstonecraft to Germaine Greer, have dedicatedly derided.

I'm not sure how I feel about the concept yet. On one hand I think it has a lot of merit - it really does seem to encapsulate the various ways in which most of us benefit from some sort of privilege in our lives. I also think it has the potential to create a lot of debate about the concept of privalge and as a result lead to a more empathic citizenry.

Yet on the other hand the concluding paragraph made me feel a little uneasy -

Whatever British feminism has achieved, it has never managed to fully convince men to get their march on. At least kyriarchy, with its emphasis on individual liberation and social equality, gives guys a chance to whinge about how they're oppressed too. And not just by the feminists.

From what I understand about the term, its not just about some sort of oppression-fest where everyone can get together and somehow, everyone becomes equal due to all the different types of oppression that everyone faces. The term does take into account the different layers and levels of discrimination that people face and the privileges that they have also.

At the end of the day, I do think that this concept is worthy of debate. It certainly raises some interesting questions both in terms of conception of oppression in our society, but also for the future of the feminist movement.

Wanted: Feminist generational debate in NZ

2010-09-12T12:50:00.000+12:00

Interesting article on Stuff today -

The number of women in positions of authority is declining for the first time in six years.

When I first saw this line, I thought, well duh! Just because we had the top 5 - 6 positions in New Zealand filled by women at one point in time doesn't mean that New Zealand is some feminist utopia and that feminism isn't necessary any more. Out of all those positions - only one (The Chief Justice) is a woman.

But what I found really interesting was the further comments from Judy McGregor -

And Human Rights Commission Equal Employment Opportunities Commissioner Judy McGregor says baby boomer women need to step aside to let younger women move up the ranks in both the public and private sectors.

and

McGregor believed it was time for the baby boomer generation to step aside, and accepted that view would cause controversy. "I do think there needs to be new and radical thinking. Younger women are there and I think we need to make space for them and for their voices and their forms of activism which are different from ours."

I'm currently writing my honours dissertation on the state of contemporary feminism in New Zealand and one thing that I've really noticed is the lack of generational debate between feminists from the 1960s and 1970s and young feminists today.

There is a quote that I found in one of my readings by Sandra Grey that raised an interesting point -

Conflict and disagreement, however, play an important role in the processes of collective identity formation. In the United States, United Kingdom and Australia in the mid to late 1990s, for example, there was ‘generational debates’ between older and younger feminists – debates that were emotive and frequently explosive. There is no evidence of such a debate in New Zealand. This lack of public debate around feminism may in fact be more problematical NZ than the internal divisions between feminist.

One thing that I've always found quite frustrating about being a young feminist in New Zealand is how utterly invisible the work that I do, and the work that fellow young feminist do is. One thing I tend to hear from older feminists is a belief that the feminist movement in NZ can only be revived if younger women are 'educated' by older feminist. Without discounting the importance of understanding the history of the feminist movement, I find this attitude rather paternalistic. It forgets that younger feminists these days are operating in quite a different cultural and political context and as a result, modes of activism and organizing can be quite different. Younger feminist then tend to be seen by the older generation as 'not doing feminism the right way'.

Jessica Valenti at Feministing wrote a post on this subject a little while back - check it out here.

I think there are quite a few challenges for the feminist movement in New Zealand - but many of these are surmountable. What do you think?

What monstrous perversions of humanity

2010-09-10T22:18:00.001+12:00

Trigger warning

So there has been this civil war happening in the Democratic Republic of Congo for sometime now - the first time I was made aware of this conflict was only two years ago and I was shocked at the time to find out that the conflict had been happening since 1998 despite an apparent peace process in 2003.

The current war has killed more people than World War II and the the prevalence of rape and sexual violence has been described as the worst in the world. It is, for want of better word, an utterly hopeless and desperate place. The use of rape and sexual violence as a tool of war is just sickening beyond belief that I can't find the words to describe how sick that it makes me feel.

The country has been in the news again -

Some 240 women, girls and babies may have been raped after rebels recently seized a town in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the UN says.

It made me think about a speech that I stumbled across two years ago by Stephen Lewis because he speaks so eloquently and with so much passion about not only this subject The audio for the speech is here - make sure you listen to all of it as he covers a range of topics centering around the subject of poverty, AIDS and feminism. Shakesville has a larger transcript here.

I live in a feminist family, I love it. I believe to the end of my days that the feminist analysis of the exercise of male power is probably the most insightful analysis to explain much of what is wrong with much of this difficult world. And I must say that the more I’ve had the privilege of working in the international community, the more I have come to the conclusion that the struggle for gender equality is the single most important struggle on the planet. You cannot continue to marginalize 52% of the world’s population and ever expect to achieve a degree of social justice and equity: it’s just not possible.

And when you look at the damage that is done to the women, particularly of the developing world, through so many perverse realities whether it’s international sexual trafficking or female genital mutilation or child brides or honor killings or an absence of inheritance rights or an absence of property rights or an absence or laws against rape and sexual violence or an absence of microcredit to give women some sense of economic autonomy or a lack of political representation – whatever the panoply of injustice, discrimination and stigma visited on women it seems to have no end, and it so profoundly compromises their existence.

He continues -

And in the case of the Congo, you have a war on women. You know, if I may make a somewhat more intellectual observation, rape is no longer a weapon of war. Rape has become a strategy of war. You rape women in such numbers, so savagely that you humiliate entire communities through the women. The women hold the communities together. On the continent of Africa, nothing happens without the engagement of the women, particularly at the grassroots, particularly on the ground. And what happens is that the entire community is subdued, oppressed, overcome by these roving bands of marauding militias, who rape the women, move the community off the extractive resources, which is what they want, or turn the women into sex slaves and the men into the laborers who do extract the resources. And it’s hideous, the consequences, and it’s been going on since 1996. More than a quarter of a million women have been raped. And what is so unfathomable about it is everyone in a position of power knows, and it continues. I’ll never never comprehend.

It makes me so angry and upset. I have no idea what I can do though?

Update: Check out http://www.stephenlewisfoundation.org/ for stuff you can do.

The economic value of earthquakes

2010-09-06T12:06:00.000+12:00

As many feminist economists have known for a long time, the measure of GDP (Gross Domestic Product) counts some very perverse things as 'creating value' for the economy.

Liam Dann, the editor of the Buisness Herald has already pointed out one of the supposed upsides of the earthquake that hit the Canterbury region on Saturday morning.

But one upside - and mercifully the lack of fatalities allows us to consider this - is that nature has unleashed the biggest job creation scheme this country has seen.

It is so odd how we count the economic response to disasters as adding value to the economy, yet the work of volunteers - the many people who have offered up their homes to people who can't live in their own, the farmers who have supported each other to ensure that dairy production continues or the many people who have turned out to help clean up the bricks and debris is invisible when we talk about value.

All of this collective volunteer work will play a crucial role in helping people and businesses get back on their feet and it will support the local economy to get going again.

Yet none of it will be counted as valuable by our national accounts.

How to deal with totally patronising and stupid lists

2010-08-27T15:26:00.000+12:00

Askmen.com is running a delightful piece on "How To Deal With Angry Feminist"

While most women who identify as feminists these days are champions of equality, there is another type of feminist that despises anything male and claims that women are superior in every way. These man-hating feminists are rare and sometimes refer to themselves as “radical” or “militant.” We just think they’re angry. When you come across an angry feminist, you may find yourself instinctively shielding your balls while trying to figure out what to do next. AskMen has your guide to dealing with angry feminists.

What a load of bullshit.

My suggestions for this list would be:

1. Learn a bit about feminism as a movement and as theory before you make generalised comments about radical and militant feminists. While you might not agree with them, the fact that you've done your homework means that you'll be able to have an actual engaging and meaninful conversation rather than relying on the things you hear in the media.

2. Don't equate being a militant or a radical feminist with being 'angry' and then dismiss this emotional response as trivial. You only have to look at the some of the nasty, horrible stuff that happens to women in the world to realise why feminists might have a freaken good reason to be just a little bit shitty. Being angry and frustrated can be a perfectly rational and logical response when you come across things like this.

3. Don't give the impression that there are 'good' feminists and 'bad' feminists in the world. Not only is it a false dischotomy, but it also neglects the fact that feminists can hold many different views and some of them may be contradictory. I know on some subjects, I can be quite liberal while on others, I can take a more radical perspective. Does that make me "good" or "bad"? The whole idea of ascribing moral values to different types of feminism is pretty screwed up. It's also a shallow analysis.

4. Don't give the impression that radical and militant feminists can't have a genuine debate. Many of the arguments that I have observed, I have noticed that the person who doesn't believe in feminism is just as narrow minded as this article paints militant and radical feminists out to be. To have meaningful debate you have to concede that the other side has a legitimate argument to make, even if you are not convinced of it yourself. The hypocrisy of the author is rather breathtaking in this regard.

5. Finally, don't call the list 'how to deal with angry feminists"! Its so patronising and implies that you've already made up your mind anyway.

Just some thoughts I came up with quickly. What are yours?

The Secret Powers of Time

2010-08-26T13:02:00.000+12:00

You must check out this Youtube clip.

It is narrated by psychologist Philip Zimbardo and it discusses our perceptions of time and how this impacts on the way in which we live, the way we interact with people and the role of technology in changing this.

If you click the video, you can find other stuff of his - there is an interesting one on capitalism as well.

A little bit of consistency please Don.

2010-08-24T10:33:00.001+12:00

A smart guy

Shock Horror!

It seems Don Brash has recently discovered that Government policy can often have an unfair impact on women. In an article that was in the New Zealand Herald yesterday, Don Brash spoke out against the idea of compulsory superannuation, noting that the scheme in Australia-

is particularly hard on women, many of whom spend only a part of their adult lives in the paid workforce;

Don Brash is right of course. Schemes like this, and even schemes like Kiwisaver do discriminate against women because they fail to understand that women and men have different life experiences and do not recognise the important underpaid work that women do in generating economic and social wealth for New Zealand. If he had done a basic Gender Studies 101 he might then understand why the work that women do is undervalued in society.

How convenient that Don Brash cares about the impact of this scheme on women when it suits him.

The Student Loan Scheme was shown to be hugely discriminatory against women due to the interest on student loans. NZUSA found in 2004 that as a result of women taking more time than men out of the workforce as well as the pay gap in society, women were taking longer to pay off their loan than men, and thus paying more in interest. In effect they were paying more for their education than their male counterparts. Totally unfair.

Of course, Don Brash supports interest on student loans – his 2025 taskforce recommended that it be reintroduced.

It would be nice if you were consistent Don. I recommend reading Marilyn Waring’s Counting for Nothing as a start.

No! Really?

2010-08-23T14:18:00.000+12:00

"Behavioural differences between the sexes are not hard-wired at birth but are the result of society's expectations, say scientists"

In short, our intellects are not prisoners of our genders or our genes and those who claim otherwise are merely coating old-fashioned stereotypes with a veneer of scientific credibility. It is a case backed by Lise Eliot, an associate professor based at the Chicago Medical School. "All the mounting evidence indicates these ideas about hard-wired differences between male and female brains are wrong," she told the Observer.

"Yes, there are basic behavioural differences between the sexes, but we should note that these differences increase with age because our children's intellectual biases are being exaggerated and intensified by our gendered culture. Children don't inherit intellectual differences. They learn them. They are a result of what we expect a boy or a girl to be."

Out of ACT-ion

2010-08-19T13:00:00.000+12:00

I have found this whole Rodney Hide vs Heather Roy ACT saga quite fascinating. On one hand, I’m happy that the party appears to be imploding. It is an understatement to say that I’m not the ACT Party’s biggest fan. At the same time, I cannot help but feel sympathy for Heather Roy and the way she has been treated by Rodney Hide.

The last time I saw Rodney Hide in action was at Forde’s Frontbench Bar during the 2008 election. Tom Ford was hosting a political debate and invited a whole range of parties –not just the main parliamentary parties but all the small little single issue ones as well. It made for an interesting experience. The problem however with this debate, was that the audience was only composed of party hacks. There were no undecided voters. By the end of the debate, the entire bar had dissolved into a shouting match between the various parties with everyone winding everyone else up.

Rodney Hide arrived half way through the debate and from my perspective, sounded every bit like how Heather Roy described him in the leaked documents. He came across as bullying, intimidating and menacing. While it was generally accepted that the debate would be ‘robust’, Hide managed to take it to a toxic level. The worst part of it though, was how he appeared to enjoy it.

This kind of behaviour is not 'just part of the job'. There are plenty of Members of Parliament on both sides of the house who do not engage in this kind of immature and bullying behaviour. The fact that Rodney Hide doesn't even appear to understand why his behaviour might be considered by others as threatening is alarming.

From what I know about Heather Roy is that she was a generally agreeable person. I know of people in the student movement who have lobbied her in the past on things that would not fit into her ideologically at all, yet found her extremely respectful and willing to listen to different points of views.

The ACT Party have successfully managed to cultivate an image of party full of white middle aged men who are frightfully unaware of their privileged status in society. Getting rid of one of ACT’s most competent MPs in such an underhanded way just reeks of an old boys club.

But I can’t say that I’m surprised.

The Angry Apple

2010-08-09T13:55:00.000+12:00

This is for Alex because it reminds me of the Upset Pomelo.

Monday morning douche bag rant

2010-08-09T10:19:00.000+12:00

Once again Steve Crow demonstrates to everyone that he is in fact, a gigantic douche bag.

“The organiser of the Boobs on Bikes event is giving away 12,500 vouchers for pornography DVDs in a move that has outraged womens' rights groups.

Steve Crow, who has several pornography businesses, said he was doing the giveaway at the Boobs on Bikes parade which is due be held in Auckland on Wednesday.

''There is a lot of evidence that ready access to porn actually reduces the incidence of rape and other sexual offences in society so this year I thought why not get behind this evidence and help do something to try and reduce the shocking levels of sexual and violent crime in our country,'' he said.”

I wish Crow would just call a spade a spade.

Admit that Boobs on Bikes is nothing more than a PR exercise, designed to generate controversy so that he can get free advertising for the Erotica Expo held later in the month.

One thing that has always bugged me is his attempt to describe Boobs on Bikes and some sort of liberating exercise for women.

If it was truly liberating for women – you’d have heaps of women, of different shapes and sizes walking down Queen Street. not worrying about their bodies being judged. The reality is that if some of the woman in the upcoming parade had saggy breasts, unshaven underarm hair/legs, a bit of belly, and various stretch marks, (as well as a whole host of things that aren’t considered normal for women) people at the parade wouldn’t be celebrating this – many of them would be jeering at these women and onlookers would waste no time making nasty comments about them.

How that fits into a definition of freedom is rather lost on me.

I remember a few years ago, when several women I know organised a small march in front of the parade. At the time, I was sick in bed so couldn’t go but one of the woman who was there described how many of the onlookers at the parade were refusing to have their pictures taken by the media. Surely, if boobs on bikes were such a celebration of freedom and liberty than why wouldn’t you want your picture taken? Oh right.

For some of the women in the parade, they may truly believe that it is a liberating experience for them. I don’t really want to argue with that or tell people how they should feel.

I don’t think Crow can make any argument that the parade is liberating for women in general. Parades and spectacles like this further reinforce the idea of women as objects to be gawked, and even then, it’s only a certain type of woman that are considered worthy enough to be gawked at.

Jean Killbourne, the director of the fabulous documentary Killing Us Softly once said, “Turning a human being into a thing is almost always the first step towards justifying violence towards that person.” When you turn people into objects you effectively dehumanise them.

One only has to read the bazillions of research papers on violence to understand the huge role that objectification and dehumanisation plays in the perpetration violence in society.

There are lots of things Crow could so if he wanted to “reducing the shocking levels of sexual and violent crime in our country”. Top-less parades down Queen Street and handing out p0rn vouchers isn’t quite up there in terms of violence prevention strategies.

The Twenty Seventh Down Under Feminist Carnival

2010-08-05T10:36:00.001+12:00

I've very exciting about being in my first Down Under Feminist Carnival!

Head over to In A Strange Land to check out the Twenty Seventh Down Under Feminist Carnival. Much thanks to Deborah for hosting it.

I like Feminist Carnivals. They're like goodie bags filled with feministy things.

Life Pie Graph

2010-08-05T09:17:00.000+12:00

Ha ha ha ha. Cry.

On Student Politics

2010-08-04T12:29:00.000+12:00

“University politics is precisely so vicious because the stakes are so low” Henry Kissinger once quipped. Although it’s unclear if he was referring to academic politics, as opposed to student politics, the quote is pretty much on the money when it comes to student association elections.

I’ve personally been involved in several AUSA election campaigns since 2006, so I’ve seen a fair few of successful and unsuccessful campaigns. Despite the fact that there is a high rollover of these candidates, the general nature of the election campaign tends to remain the same.

One of the things most noticeable is what has been coined as the ‘AUSA bubble’. The AUSA bubble encompasses many actors - student executives, staff, volunteers, student media, club people, faculty associations and individuals. It expands significantly during the course of an AUSA election. It’s similar to the concept of the ‘Beltway’. Let me explain.

In an American sense, the beltway is (thanks to Wikipedia)

“used to characterize parts of the real or imagined American political system. It refers to the Capital Beltway (Interstate 495), a beltway that encircles Washington, D.C., and is meant to invoke matters that are important primarily within the offices of the Federal government, its contractors, lobbyists, and the media which cover them.”

The term itself can be used quite disparagingly to describe political issues that don’t have much resonance outside this ‘beltway.’

John Armstrong gives quite a good description:

The Beltway is the road which encircles Washington DC. Inside the Beltway live the politicians, bureaucrats, lobbyists and media who feed on the minutiae of day-to-day politics.

Beyond the Beltway, the rest of the population simply get on with their lives.

The AUSA bubble operates on much the same way. When you’re inside the bubble, everything that happens, not matter how small is considered of utmost importance. People spend a lot of time worrying and stressing about issues and problems that, when you get outside of the bubble, your average student doesn’t care about.

A classic case of the AUSA bubble operating is during student election time. For instance, people often make the assumption that if you get a faculty association to back you; you’re guaranteed to get a fair few votes. In reality this has not always played out. Endorsements do matter to some extent, but very few students actually care and I’ve seen candidates not get endorsed by any associations and have still won, often by large margins. On the flip side, I’ve seen candidates from various groups, clubs and faculty associations believe that because of the club endorsement, they won’t have to put the hard work in and have subsequently not campaigned hard and then been somewhat surprised when they haven’t won. They’ve usually worked so hard to get faculty or club endorsement that actually forgotten to campaign on the streets.

The problem with the AUSA bubble, is that the people within in, believe much of the hype. AUSA elections are hard work – they require early mornings, late nights, and the huge pressure to speak to 16 lecture theatres and talk to as many individuals students as possible. It is tough!

If you’re a candidate and someone has told you that “so and so club” is backing your opponent, it can be hard on your morale to keep going, especially if you’re a first time candidate. When you’re giving up study time, paid work time and your leisure time, it can be somewhat soul destroying to feel like the work is all being done for nothing. I’ve seen people give up half way through a campaign because of this stuff, only to realise when the results have been declared that there were running a pretty close race and if they’d kept going, they’d probably be in with a strong chance of winning.

In the end, the average student who votes doesn’t care that Faculty Association X has endorsed a candidate, or that Candidate A has got the backing and support of Club Z. They’re usually totally oblivious to all political machinations that are going on behind the scenes. Think about it. There are roughly 30, 000 students who attend Auckland University. There are maybe 100-200 core people who are part of the bubble. There are thousands of people out there who are totally unaware of political intrigue that surrounds these elections.

One thing that I always find funny is all the so called ‘experts’ that pop out of the woodwork around election time. You’ll hear people talking with authority about the reasons for student voter choices. The reality is, no one actually knows. Some students might like a candidate’s poster that has a lame joke, while others might be turned off by it. Some students might appreciate a candidate who talks about kittens and puppies, while others might respect the knowledge of tertiary education that another candidate has. Some students think about the choices they make when they vote, others just vote for candidates they can remember.

In the end, there is no hard and fast way to win an election. Most of it comes down to hard work on the campaign trail , never assuming that you’re ahead, and persevering even if you think you’re behind. Even then, you might not win.

The irony of this post is, although I don't care about the stupid bubble, by writing on it, I'm ascribing it some legitimacy. I guess it shows how it can totally suck you in, even you are aware of it.

Voting for AUSA elections is open now, till Thursday at 4pm. If you’re an AUSA member (and you should be), remember to cast your vote. Results will be announced on Thursday night.

Muffins vs Cupcakes

2010-08-03T11:22:00.001+12:00

The Auckland Food Show Trip

2010-08-01T17:40:00.000+12:00

Me after the food show

I popped along to the Auckland Food Show today. It was great fun. After persuading one of my friends to come along, we managed to find cheapish parking near the show grounds and then nearly got soaked walking into the convention center. Thankfully, I had already bought tickets on Friday so we didn't have to wait in the cold for tickets.

Funnily enough the food show reminded me a bit of the Erotica expo that I went to several years ago.* For instance, after a while at the Erotica expo you get bored of seeing diloes, vibrators, and various different types of flavoured lube. The Food Show can be a bit like that - a lot of hummus/spread/dip stalls, quite a few wine, beer and other alcohol stalls and quite a lot of olive oil stands.

Nevertheless, we had a pretty fun time - we had to do the rounds twice to make sure we got to try everything. I ended up buying some avocado oil infused with lemon which I've always wanted to buy. I also bought some free trade chocolate drinking powder, some marinated haloumi which was absolutely divine, and finally three different types of olives - balsamic marinated olives, Sicilian olives and olives stuffed with pesto.

There were a couple of stalls that I thought were out of place. The first one that I thought was a bit off was the hair removal stall - is there some advertising research that shows that foodies are hairy people? The second one, which I thought was totally offensive from a foodie point of view, was a stall that was promoting a pill that could apparently help you lose weight in your sleep. Maybe they thought we'd all feel guilty after gorging ourselves on free samples?

Unfortunately I'm off to a family dinner tonight. Most of the time this is a good thing - nice wine and good food. I guess I'll have to have small portions. Ha.

*I went to this when I was in my first year of university. I hadn't really developed my feminism and hadn't at that point in time realized who Steve Crowe was, and what a gigantic douchebag he was. I'm not against expos of this kind - in fact I think parts of them are very sex positive. I do however have a problem with the glamorization of porn stars and a whole heap of other things, but that is for another post.

New feminist blog

2010-07-31T19:18:00.000+12:00

Check out this new feminist blog - Mothers For Choice Aotearoa New Zealand

Mothers For Choice is a group of women from Aotearoa NZ who are mothers and hold a pro-choice position on abortion.

We include amongst our number mothers who have one child, several children; are single, married, in a civil union, in a defacto relationship, widowed, separated; have had fertility problems, have suffered miscarriages, have had unplanned pregnancies, have had abortions; are step-mothers; are religious, are atheists, are agnostic; and hail from a variety of different cultures and backgrounds.

We define a pro-choice position on abortion as:

Respecting the right of individual women to choose for themselves whether or not to continue a pregnancy, without the need to seek permission from anyone else for a termination.

Mothers For Choice has started up in support of the key elements of a bill Steve Chadwick (a Labour MP) has been considering putting in the ballot for Private Member’s Bill. While the Bill has not yet been drafted, we support what we understand to be its main provisions, namely:

abortion available on demand (i.e. woman concerned decides) to 24 weeks
abortion with medial practitioner’s support after 24 weeks when appropriate
decriminalize abortion (remove from Crimes Act)
make it an offence for an unqualified person to carry out an abortion (pregnant woman not to be charged)
regulate health practitioners involved in terminations
health practitioners who have conscientious objection to abortion must inform women they can access abortion from elsewhere

Friday Afternoon Fun - Second Chris Carter letter found!

2010-07-30T14:14:00.000+12:00

Over at The Tongan Prince, another letter from Chris Carter has been found....

The Most Important Thing A Woman Will Do In Her Entire Life

2010-07-30T13:50:00.000+12:00

Rebecca Traister over at Broadsheet has written a really interesting column about the upcoming wedding of Chelsea Clinton in which she critiques much of the commentary surrounding these nuptials.

"I don't mean to be the Matrimony Grinch. Weddings are joyful and great. What they are not is the apotheosis of the human, the romantic or, more pointedly, the female experience."

I wrote an article a few months ago on the subject of marriage and one of the things I noted was the amount of high school friends and acquaintances getting engaged and married. This in itself is nothing of note, rather it was the way in which people responded to all the facebook relationship changes. Rarely was the groom congratulated with the whole "OMG CONGRATULATIONS BABE XXXX", very few men put up photos of their suit, their groomsmen suits, the rings or discussed how lucky they were. It seemed that getting married was very much about 'making it' as a woman.

Traister goes on to critique some of the comments that Bill Clinton has said in the past few weeks about how watching his daughter getting married, proves to him that he's made it as a parent. In his words "You know it proves you've done what you were supposed to do, but it doesn't make it entirely easy."

I heart what Traister writes next:

"What about "handing off" your daughter to another man proves that you've done your work as a father? How does it demonstrate that you've done what you're supposed to do more vividly than watching your daughter graduate from college, make friends, live independently, land big jobs, develop and follow through on ambitions, help her mother run for president? When Bill later told People magazine that Chelsea's wedding would be "the biggest day in her life, probably," I'm sure he meant well, but I kind of wanted to throttle him. What about the days on which she might pick up her master's degree, run a company, have a child, win the presidency? What about the day, already past, on which she fell in love with her betrothed, surely as life-changing as the one on which they will make it legal?"

I've always had a problem with the concept of a father handing his daughter away at a wedding ceremony. I don't care if people think its nice and traditional. "Handing your daughter away" conjures up negative connotations of ownership and objectification which don't have a place in a modern society.

"You know what weddings are? They are parties. They're often happy, often tacky celebrations of love and family and commitment. Sure, some are elaborate spectacles and networking events; some are stirringly simple; some are movingly grand. Who knows how tasteful or how extravagant the marriage of the only Clinton daughter will turn out to be? Who -- besides those who really love her and her future husband -- really cares?"

Traister is right. Weddings are super fun. I love going to them. I've had great fun at the last few I've went to. But they're not The Most Important Thing Women Will Do In Her Entire Life. And they certainly not the only markers of success in terms of female achievement.

Cooking with Coolio

2010-07-29T13:34:00.000+12:00

Once of the reasons why I like reading the Huffington Post is that they always have these quirky lists. Just yesterday I read a list about the world's best architerctually designed bridges. Facinating.

Looking at this picture can you guess what the list will be?

Oh Coolio. I remember when you came to New Zealand and no one came to your concert.

Check out the list here.

My trip to the Arts and Craft Fair on Saturday

2010-07-26T19:00:00.000+12:00

Now that I've finished with my involvement in student politics, I've got a lot of free time. Like weekends. And evenings.

The problem with student politics is that it has the potential to make you a very dull person. Last year, my whole life revolved around my job and I didn't have much time to indulge in various leisure activities.

One of things that I did was write a list of projects, events and activities that I wanted to try out.

One of those things was to check out Arts and Crafts Fairs.

So last Saturday, I found myself at a small Arts and Craft Fair that was held in the Auckland Art Gallery. There were some creative creations as well as some cute knick knacky items.

Although I'm so broke at the moment, I couldn't resist buying this print.

If you know me well, you'll know that my favourite fruit is lemons and my favourite alcoholic drink is a classic G&T.

This print was created by a talented english woman called Colleen. She has a blog that has other quirky prints.

Six or less clothes for a month?

2010-07-26T18:42:00.000+12:00

The New York Times has an interesting piece on two women who created a project that was based on only wearing six or less clothes over the course over a month. Clothes had to fit in with work, leisure as well as more social and formal wear. Undies, bras, socks and shoes were not included.

"Nearly a month into what amounted to just such a self-inflicted fast of fashion, Stella Brennan, 31, an insurance sales executive from Kenosha, Wis., realized last week that not even her husband, Kelly, a machinist, had yet figured out that she had been wearing the same six items, over and over, since June 21. The sad punch line is that Mr. Brennan is the one who actually does the laundry in the family."

It sounds like a pretty ambitious project.

I find it particularly interesting the way in which these two women have tied their project back to the issue of excessive consumerism. I often look at my own wardrobe and shudder, thinking about all the items of clothing I've bought, but have only worn once or twice.

"Last summer, Ms. Bjornsen, 47, said she was thinking about how years of easy credit had led to overspending on cars, homes and luxury goods. Then, looking in her own closet, she realized that she was part of the problem, she said. For her job, as a representative of commercial photographers in Seattle and before that as a marketing executive at fashion companies like Nike and Nordstrom, she’d spent $5,000 to $10,000 a year on clothes.

“I was buying in an egregious way,” Ms. Bjornsen said. “I was just kind of grossed out by the whole thing.”

Worth a try?

Cooking with the Citrus King

2010-07-25T22:19:00.000+12:00

I originally wrote this for Craccum this year.

The original intent of this column was to present student friendly meals cooked from basic pantry ingredients. This week however is somewhat of a radical departure - I will be cooking with pomelo.

I cooked this week with my flatmate Alex Nelder. Alex is currently the Education Vice President of AUSA, a position I once held. We share a special bond, speaking a language that only EVPs understand. Alex is also a tragic, yet comical, young man who defines "pie sandwiches" as a culinary food sensation. It depresses me so much I use my own money (and food) to keep him in good health. Often described as the poor hapless cousin from the country, Alex's purchase of canned vegetables was a particular low point. Despite his nutritional shortcomings Alex is a happy lad who provides much and joy and laughter to our flat.

Last week I dragged Alex and my partner Joe along to Nosh in Mt Eden. Nosh is an awesome shop that stocks gourmet food and other assorted goodies. While being left alone in the fruit section, Alex spied a large greenish-yellowish fruit called a Pomelo and insisted on buying it. Upon arriving home and looking it up on Wikipedia, he discovered that the scientific name for the pomelo was 'citrus maxima' - or as Alex described it - 'the king of fruit'.

Pomelos (according to Wikipedia) are similar to a large grapefruit, but with a much milder taste. They have a substantial pith (the stuff between the rind and the actual fruit). We searched the Internet and found a reasonably easy recipe for pomelo. Most of the recipes that I found were Thai, using lots of coriander and other classic Thai ingredients.

The was a mixed verdict on the recipe. Three of my flatmates enjoyed the salad, yet Joe and Alex remained unimpressed. While Alex liked the recipe, he didn't like the "taste". When he first moved in he stated "I don't like taste", so I'm not too offended.

This recipe was tasty with a really good fresh feel to it- a little different to the Thai salad you may be used to. If (like Alex) you have said you would serve Wattie's "Big Eat" to potential girlfriends, you may not like it. Certainly the best use of a $5 fruit I have seen in my time.

Thai Pomelo Salad

Ingredients

1 pomelo fruit, yielding about 2 cups
1 cup cherry tomatoes
2 spring onions
1 bunch fresh coriander

Dressing

1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 lime, juice of
1/2 garlic clove, grated
1/2 teaspoon chili flakes

Optional ingredients

1/3 cup unsalted dry roasted peanuts (optional)

Directions

Peel the pomelo as you would an orange, keeping only the flesh (as whole as possible) without any menbranes.

Half or quarter the cherry tomatoes, slice the spring onions and the whole coriander bunch - toss together with the pomelo.

Combine the ingredients for the dressing and pour over the salad - toss well but be careful not to break the pomelo too much.Before serving, you can sprinkle the unsalted roasted peanuts - slightly crushed over the salad.

First Post

2010-07-25T22:08:00.001+12:00

After much procrastination and much dithering, I have decided to set up a blog about stuff I find interesting. The topics of this blog will mainly focus on food, as I love cooking, as well as feminism, because I like beingoutraged at things.