Victoria Browne made the case for celebrating even the smallest of victories as a way of not losing heart and staying engaged. Afterwards, Victoria and Fiona were joined by Louise MacKenzie and Judith Hunter from Glasgow City Council Equality Network, Kate Reid, Louise Sheridan and Valerie Wright, for a roundtable which lead to a surprisingly personal discussion about the challenges faced by women today – especially when trying to bring up children, and girls in particular, in a culture of intense sexualisation of women …
Tag: child abuse
Throwing the First Punch for Battered Mothers
… modern advances in the judicial system … give abused mothers fighting for child custody a reason to believe change is coming. In 2004, the State of Wisconsin’s legislature passed a law that “instructs judges to make domestic violence their top priority by stating that ‘if the courts find that a parent has engaged in a pattern or serious incident of interspousal battery, or domestic abuse, the safety and well-being of the child and the safety of the parent who was the victim of the battery or abuse shall be the paramount concerns in determining legal custody and periods of physical placement” … [Meanwhile] the child protective agency of the city of New York was discovered to have “unconstitutionally removed children from the custody of their non-abusive battered mothers after substantiating mothers for engaging in domestic violence” … Although this may not seem like hopeful news in itself, the fact that this injustice was revealed is a step in the right direction.
Socialist Women for Justice in Oz
In 2007, five women met in Taree at the cafe Raw Sugar for breakfast; a nurse, a teacher, a women’s refuge worker, a school assistant and I, an author and retiree. The original three are members of the Australian Labor (not Labour) Party. Therefore, although the meeting was not politically driven, the conversations had little to do with knitting tea cosies or cooking. It was not long before it was realised that talking was not enough; we were just going around in circles. Socialist Women for Justice was the answer.
Taking Control Now – Part 1
Conscious of coming from a society of many nationalities in all colours and shapes, I was constantly reminded I was different. Some friends would say, in winter, when everyone was wearing stockings, gloves and beret: ‘Gee, you wouldn’t know that you were brown from behind.’ Constantly telling me that I was not quite one of them, they seemed preoccupied with colour. I reacted violently.
By the end of first term I had bashed up everyone bashable. Everybody else ran away. I came home with my school books and ripped right through them all with my biro, screaming, ranting and raving and demanding to go home. My foster father asked if I would like to try another school. No, but I didn’t want to return to the violence of Retta Dixon Homes. My foster father encouraged me. I went to Greystanes. Half the teachers were Jews, including the principal. The other half were white Australians. I got on with all the Jews, and with very few of the others.I still fought and argued with teachers but began to settle down.
16 Days Against Violence Against Women: Lucy Faithfull (or was she Lady Faithless?) – Mother to Hundreds
An account of Lucy Faithfull’s life is a history of child care in the twentieth century. She was a passionate campaigner for children, Children’s Officer for Oxford, and the first social worker to sit in the House of Lords. In…