Week 2 - Womens Amazing Bodies What does it mean to be a lady?
After this weeks class, one of the questions that really stuck with me was what does it mean to be a lady? From the time we are born as a girl, we are groomed into being a lady, but what is a lady? Being a lady is a completely arbitrary concoction of socially constructed ideas and behaviours and for a woman to be considered a ‘lady’, she must abide by these constructs.
I was lucky that my parents raised me to value good manners, but in the exact same way they raised my brother to have good manners. To what extent is having good manners considered being lady-like? Someone who has appeared on several different television shows I have seen recently is June Dally-Watkins, a self-made business woman who is considered the leading lady in fashion and etiquette throughout the ages in Australia. Initially, I thought how wild is this! An old woman telling other women that they are not ‘ladies’ because of the way they eat, sit, or chew gum, that’s crazy. However, one of June’s quotes really resonates with me as I could not agree with it more, “many [young people] don't understand good manners simply means being kind, thoughtful and considerate to other human beings.” However, June’s classes in etiquette would be very different if a male were to take one in comparison to a female.
June dally-watkins
I also saw in the news this week female golfers outraged as they have been forced to tone down and conform to societal constructs in how they express their own femininity. Female pro golfers now have strict guidelines for what they must wear in competition after officials thought some competitors were wearing hyper-sexualised outfits that had become distracting in competition. How on earth is the female body distracting during elite sporting competitions, are we not admiring the female bodies athleticism? American golfer Paige Spiranac said, “Most likely, this edict was put into place to eliminate the presence of cleavage. In that case, a curvier, fuller-figured woman would be chided and fined far more often than a woman with a smaller bust.”We are taking steps backwards in the fight for equality when we cannot even have equity amongst women in elite sport.
LPGA chiefs have told players that skirts must not be too short
This video is a perspective that makes it all a little more obvious.
Week 3 - Women in Popular Culture, Advertising, and the Media – Implications for Social Inequalities and Women's Health Strong Women in the Bible
I found it interesting in this weeks lecture that the bible still plays a large role in the construction of gender in society and in the media. With more and more young people leaning towards secular beliefs and falling out of religious practice, it could be seen as strange that the story of Genesis is still informing gender roles in our society. I was raised catholic and studied religion at a catholic school, so I know that women are oppressed in the church in many ways. We cannot step forward as leaders of the church, priests cannot marry a woman, for a long time in history women were even separated from men in the church (and still are in many denominations). Women of faith have made little inroads in the fight for equality. However, with the presence of strong women in the media slowly increasing, many people look past the handful of strong women in the bible as role models for modern females.
The most well-known story right from childhood is the story of Genesis and unfortunately this is the story that most likely resonates the most with men and subconsciously informs women of their ‘role’ in society. What about strong women like Ruth, Miriam, Mary and Mary Magdalene? These women have little screen time in the bible so to speak, but play a massive role in how the entire story plays out. Without these women, Christianity as we know it would not exist.
In a time when women were still outcasts in society simply because of their most basic bodily functions, Mary falling pregnant as a virgin would have been unbelievably difficult to come to terms with. If Mary had not have been recently married to Joseph and spontaneously fell pregnant, she would have been outcast from society or killed. Even Joseph planned to "send her away privately" (Matthew 1:19), meaning divorce her after he found out she was pregnant. Mary was on track to be a pregnant virgin, outcast from her community because of it and then have to raise a child alone and she took it all in her stride. Obviously the bible offers little detail on her pregnancy itself, but we know what came of it. She had to give birth in a stable, it’s a miracle that she even survived childbirth, but she did and she went on to become one of the most important characters in Christianity. A woman. Someone who should be admired for being an absolute trooper, but she isn’t appreciated nearly enough, because that’s just what women do.
I think that it is easy to see a link between how women are portrayed in the bible for the most part, and how this plays a part in the construction of women in popular culture and media. In saying this, it is up to us to build the link between the strong women we see in the bible and strong women that are most certainly there in the media, just not in the spotlight.
Week 4 - The 'Right Time' to have a child: Changing Trends in Child Bearing and Rearing Pregnancy throughout Generations
Listening to this weeks lecture, I found it difficult to relate to because at this stage in my life, pregnancy, child birth and raising a child aren't even on my radar. I keep thinking, how could anyone my age (19) be in a position where they feel ready and prepared to care for a child. I don't mean this in a judgmental way at all, I'm just at a point in my life where I can't even comprehend planning pregnancy later on in life, let alone an unplanned pregnancy now, I can't even look after myself at the moment! But then I keep seeing girls who I graduated school with who are overjoyed because they have fallen pregnant, and I'm happy that they're happy, of course I wonder how on earth they are going to do it but I'm happy for them. Then I see that one of them has been kicked out of home because of it, is unemployed and the father of her child is also between jobs and it scares me. On the other end of the spectrum, another one of these girls has full support from her parents, they're even possibly happier than she is.
Then I see how different my life would be if I was born in another country, especially a developing country. I would probably have multiple children by now, after being married early. I would be counting my blessings that I survived pregnancy and child birth. But I wouldn't necessarily be upset about it, because that's the way things are in my culture, and I wasn't expected to do anything other than fall into motherhood at an early age.
It's hard to predict what my generations attitude towards pregnancy will be, whether we wish to start a family relatively young or wait and see how far we go in the workforce before having children. For my mother, she had her first child fairly young compared to all her friends but not necessarily young at all nowadays. My eldest brother is 2.5 years older than many of my mums friends' eldest children. This changed the way that mum was living her life, as pregnancy does, but she always tells me how she was working up until her due date for my brother (he was 10 days overdue), and for her fourth and last pregnancy she was playing basketball at 8 months pregnant. She still got to finish her degree and work for a few years before having her first child, something that many women these days don't get. I know that my mum is a great role model in showing that life doesn't have to change drastically once you fall pregnant. She went against the status quo by continuing to work full-time from home while she had 2 kids at school and 2 at home with her. Then once all the kids were in school she decided that she wanted a change so she went back to university and studied full-time with 4 kids under the age of 13.
In Western culture, teen pregnancy is documented and broadcast as entertainment.
Then I think of my grandmothers, both of whom I am lucky to still have around. My mothers mother did not complete high school (not unusual for her generation), had 2 children in her twenties and no longer worked full time, and only ever worked part time in the family business afterwards. My fathers mother had 5 children again in her twenties, she did not work while the kids were young, but is still working full time to this day. Neither have university degrees or year 12 education.
What was normal for them, is nowhere near 'normal' for me. Of course this is going to be different for the woman next to me and the woman next to her. It's going to be different for girls in different regions in Australia let alone around the world.
US data. 2017 The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy.
For me it was never a question whether I would finish high school and go to university, my parents never forced this on me, that's just how my mum did it, so I have never thought otherwise about how I might do it. However, for those girls that I graduated with, it's quite likely that their mothers were in a similar situation to what they are in now, so it's not unusual for them at all to be pregnant or considering pregnancy. Cultural trends and socio-economic status impact pregnancy and motherhood in some amazing ways and it's interesting to see how these changes have evolved and how they are going to continue evolving in the future.
Week 5 - Changing Gender Roles in Families: Paid work, house work, and child-raising. Changing Dad's, Changing Mum's ... Right?
A lot of the content in this weeks lecture did not come as a surprise to me. I went to an all girls high school where empowering women was a large focus in all areas of school life. We had an entire year 12 English unit just on feminism where we covered the roles of women in families, the workplace and society in general, so the disparity between men and women was not news to me. Even before this, I think this mindset of women being inferior to men especially in the workplace is deeply engrained in our society. My sister had always dreamed of being an orthopaedic surgeon, since birth she has spent a lot of time with her own orthopaedic surgeon. When she was actually starting to plan her path towards becoming one, her surgeon who had become a close family friend told her that he did not want to see her in a mans world where she probably wouldn't ever be able to achieve what she is capable of, simply because she's a woman. If she chooses to have children, her professional life will be severely compromised in comparison to her male counterparts who are using that time as hugely important times of growth and development. She would be left in the rear vision mirror, not to mention the alleged 'great difference' in strength between male and female orthopaedic surgeons. This struck a chord with me.
Lately, I have been noticing changes in the role of the 'dad'. Compared to my father who was by no means absent in my childhood but certainly did not play as large a role in child-raising as my Mum, these modern fathers are changing the status quo. I worked at a shoe store during two 'Back to School' periods, which are a great time to understand different families operating like well-oiled or barely moving machines. I saw lots of what my mum likes to call 'Designer Dad's'. These are dads who are greatly involved in the child-raising roles in the family. Dad's who will walk in the park pushing a twin pram with the dog tied to it and another child strapped onto their chest and a coffee in one hand. It's actually an amazing image to see, I certainly don't have enough coordination for all that. It was dad's who would come in and be totally in charge of purchasing all the kids school shoes (a rather difficult task at times) then they would be off to collect school uniforms and books and drop them into school while meeting the teachers the next week. This is certainly a changing dynamic, evolving in recent years.
Modern Mums and Domestic Dads
So if we are seeing these drastic changes to the role of the father, if we applied physics to it all, Newtons Third Law (For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction), would indicate a change in the role mothers play in these families, right? Well you'd think so. Family dynamics are changing in incredible ways, no longer is it totally unacceptable (it's still seen as pretty darn crazy though) for women to be working mothers and have stay at home dads.
Have we actually made much progress? This film was made in 2015 - the extremely successful working mother and her stay-at-home-dad husband's marriage falls to pieces when the husband has an affair feeling his like his masculinity is threatened by being the only dad at school activities and having a more successful wife.
So why have we seen little to no changes in the gender pay gap. I find it really hard to accept that men are being encouraged to be stay at home dads while their wives/partners are encouraged to go back into the workforce quickly and yet we are seeing little reward for these women. Again, for every action there should be an equal and opposite reaction, for every woman who moves into the workforce after having a child, we should see benefits in pay, and in opportunities, because it's a pretty rough gig. 'The Intern' is a recent move that looks at the struggles of working mothers. She's running her own company and her husband decides he needs to start cheating on her because his manhood is threatened, she's more successful than him which neither him nor the community around them like. I'm finding that a lot of things I see these days are different because of this unit, something I don't mind, but very interesting.
Week 6 - Domestic Violence
Domestic Violence - Women, Men, Children and Change
Thinking back on this weeks lecture, it is hard to pick one concept that stuck with me, I think anything to do with domestic violence is uncomfortable to really think about because it's an uncomfortable topic. The more I research it and think about it, the more grateful I am that I have not been directly impacted by it yet. I say yet because the statistics are overwhelmingly against me simply based on age and gender.
There are countless organisations and campaigns out there trying to change the rates of domestic violence and the relationship between men and women in violent or conflict based relationships. Many are targeted at men, asking them to make a change and many are targeted at the general public asking them to avoid becoming bystanders in domestic violence. Some are targeted at professionals in different fields who may be in a position to help women and men caught up in domestic violence, but there are little asking women to make a change. I wanted to look into this to see why this might be, but now I know there are so many more factors involved than simply just 'leaving'.
I am a big 'Survivor' fan and I won't miss an episode of it. Thinking about domestic violence victims in this way has helped me try to gain an understanding of what it may be like in that situation. (NB. I use life here metaphorically, as in life in the game of survivor) First of all, you are not the only one involved in the situation and your life is in the hands of the people around you. Everyone on Survivor are sitting ducks and without a carefully planned and executed manipulation of events, you won't get to the end of the game. It is not as simple as going in and establishing yourself as the best player in the game, as you will quickly find that many people find this threatening and will quickly dispose of you, it's a dangerous play to put yourself out there. Similarly, when people who say, "It would only take one time and I'd be out of there!" about domestic and family violence, don't understand that it's not that simple and to get yourself to the end game safely, there are many complex decisions to be made considering, your own safety and wellbeing, and the safety and wellbeing of your children or other family members.
I saw the above video on my Facebook feed a little while ago and found it again when I was thinking about DV and Survivor. As public health practitioners there isn't a lot we can do except be a pillar of support. An often frustrating job, but extremely important in the entire scheme of things. This campaign encourages not just health practitioners but everyone to listen, not just to what they are actually saying but what they are actually meaning. It's a great video to understand just how creative some women in violent situations have to be, but also how important it is that our ears are actually open to interpret this creativity.
Week 7 - Womens Health in Same-Sex Relationships
"Women Can't Hurt Each other"
This weeks content was quite shocking for me. I was completely aware of the struggles that homosexual women face socially, but I wasn't aware of how many different hurdles they come across in their health and wellbeing. After this I wanted to look further into the poor representation of women in same-sex relationships in health promotion. What I found most interesting was that research estimates that 25% to 33% of LGBT relationships are abusive (which is the approximately the same as heterosexual statistics) (Brown University, 2015). Yet there are next to no specific services provided for women in same sex abusive relationships. Many women think that because they are not legally married they cannot claim domestic violence has occurred. This is not true but is a significant barrier in victims seeking help. What really upsets me is that what is advertised as a safe space for women in abusive relationships are often women's shelters. These shelters are gender sensitive but do not account for the fact that a victims abusive partner in a same-sex relationship can still gain access to these shelters. Lesbian women are either offered health care for heterosexual women or are offered very little health care at all, with some health practitioners assuming that they don't need the same level of sexual health care for example, which is completely false. Similarly, many women who report abuse in a same-sex relationship feel as though their reports are not taken seriously because another women is not capable of hurting someone like a man. They face these attitudes from people who should be a pillar of support for them.
The short film above is an award winning short film that depicts an abusive same sex relationship. I think that while it shows some of the barriers that lesbian women face in this situation, I believe that it could have depicted some of the more challenging barriers that are faced by these women such as the discrimination faced or the fact that their partners may be holding them back by threatening to out their sexual orientation, HIV status or even losing your identity outside of that relationship. Again, the assumption that women can't or won't physically hurt other women like men can, is very dangerous for homosexual women. Many think that their friends and family won't take them seriously because of these stereotypes and preconceived thoughts. I hope that soon public health practitioners can begin building support networks for these women. Some people think that marriage equality is the last step in achieving true equality, but there is so much more that needs to change. Until lesbian women have equal access to basic health care, feel comfortable even holding hands in public and receive the same reaction and help they need in abusive relationships we have a LONG way to go.
Week 8 - Mental Health & Substance Abuse in Women Across the Ages Addiction: A woman in a man's world...
I have to say I wasn't overly surprised by the re-emerging trend of housewives and substance abuse and even working women and substance abuse. To me it's the most intense job in the world, you don't ever even get a break, there's no weekends to relax and there isn't any paid leave, nor do you have a team of coworkers to share the load with when you're a mum. For me even babysitting is stressful and I'm being PAID!
After this weeks lecture I went home and spoke to my Mum about her thoughts on the topic. Mum is a high school teacher and she was immediately engaged when I started talking to her about it. She said that she was totally gobsmacked when she saw a study showing that the fastest growing demographic of substance abusers is middle aged women. A lot of her job in an all girls school is about empowering young women to avoid a lifestyle where they rely on drugs and alcohol either for fun or to get them through each day. But what people don't realise is that women battling addiction, especially mothers and working women, are already disadvantaged when seeking help and treatment. Journalist and recovering addict, Jenny Valentish has recently written a book, 'Woman of Substances' which is a memoir/research project. She says, "I wanted to write about the female experience because there's a norm across society today, and men are that norm." "Everything about addiction, from the way we talk about it to the way that it is treated, is tailored to men's experience."
Seeing this work from someone having both the perspective of looking from the inside out and from the outside in, I wanted to see more of Jenny Valentish's story. I wanted to include this quote because I believe this sums up what I couldn't articulate because I had never really looked at it like this but it is so true. She explains, "Men's addiction stories are often framed as tales of daring, whereas women's drinking and substance abuse is seen as 'sad' or 'irresponsible', especially if you're a mum". In popular media culture, working men and middle/upperclass fathers struggling with abuse are shown as being bold and undaunted and maybe shown as a little guilty. But women? Mothers? Working women battling addiction? These women's stories are represented as pitiful and totally wrong, "how is she fit to be looking after children?"
I thought this was a really clever video having a poke at the unrealistic advertising approaches towards women's health. We are treated like robots! Has much changed since the 1950's housewife boom? Under the surface I don't think so, we are still targeted as though we are crazy and that a simple drug will "fix you". I think this is how and why women get caught in the trap of substance abuse so easily. First it becomes an easy escape from societies pressures to conform; feel a certain way, look a certain way, behave in a certain way. Then it becomes the ultimate numbing of the painful reality that women are exposed to. We aren't men. 30-59% of women with a substance abuse problem have experienced some kind of trauma in their past, often sexual abuse, and yet women who find the courage to face societal stigma and judgement in asking for help with their addiction, are asked to be part of an AA meeting sitting next to a man. Women with young children can't access rehabilitation services without having to find somewhere for the kids to go and heaven forbid people found out where she was going while the kids were being babysat. It's these kinds of attitudes that are detrimental to women's mental health and are what is trapping women in a never ending spiral of addiction.
That is the link to an article written about Jenny Valentish's book and some of her perspectives on the issue which was a really interesting read.
Week 9 - The Fashion Industry And Body Image: Impact On Women's Health
13 going on 30
Going to an all girls school, I think once a year we would have an external speaker come in and speak to us about body image, the media and the fashion industry. At the time it seemed a bit trivial. One year I would be thinking, I'll never be impacted by this, I'm not that naive, and then the next year I would be totally shocked by how relevant and scary it all was. It seemed the older I got, the more hyperaware I became of just how vulnerable young women are to body image issues. After this lecture, it became clear that it's not something that just affects young girls, unrealistic and totally ridiculous expectations are thrust upon women of every age.
The video of the human Barbie Doll I had seen before, but for some reason when I watched it this time it scared me. Before I thought it was funny... yes, ridiculous...definitely! Now, in the context of everything we have looked at so far in this unit, it really upset me that this woman has decided that she's happiest with herself when she looks fake. What upset me more, was the reaction of the morning show hosts at the end of the clip. Reactions like that are why women can't feel comfortable in who they are, and when they try to conform to what it is that society asks for, they are body shamed and laughed at for their idea of beauty.I started watching the movie, '13 going on 30' or 'Suddenly 30' after the lecture and was startled by how when I last watched this movie, it seemed so unrealistic. This time, I found myself looking at it from another perspective. It's so true that girls even from the age of 13 are devastated because they don't have boobs. The catchy part of it may have changed but girls want to be thirty, flirty and thriving. It's the age of sexy. So many women are totally and unequivocally consumed by their body image. I have no judgement towards these women, they are simply a product of the society we live in.
Week 10 - The Health of Australian Indigenous Women: What are the Key Challenges? Black White Woman Although this week we missed out on an actual lecture due to a public holiday, I was really interested by the materials on Blackboard on this topic so I wanted to look a bit further into the issue. Any Public Health unit will tell you about the extreme disparities between the health of white australians and Indigenous Australians. The health gap is astonishing. Until now though, I had never really thought about the role that women play in this. I found a video that was made as a comedy but I think that the discomfort I felt watching this clip is a true indicator of the discomfort everyone should feel about how we treat Indigenous women in a health sense.
Yes, it's supposed to be a funny exaggeration but I think that the statistics showing the health gaps between White and Indigenous women paint the exact same picture. Apparently, we face starkly different health battles to each other. Yet, health practitioners seem to have no issue with how obviously uncomfortable Indigenous women feel when white women attempt to be one of them, it simply doesn't work that way.
The mini-documentary in the clip above shows the much greater fight that Indigenous women are fighting with domestic violence in the shadow of white women. The first 20 seconds of this video though was the most eye opening for me.
"Our issues are continually discussed by people who have no link to them whatsoever."
Aboriginal women have been left behind in women's health advances over time as they have been fighting for basic human rights and now they are suffering the consequences. Obstetrician Stephen Robson seems to think that in a cultural sense, improving Aboriginal women's health is the key to improving population health. "The statistics presented and the picture painted for the assembled group was disheartening. The gap between the health of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians seemed too great to bridge.
Discouraged, I asked one of the senior presenters where we could even start to help, to put things right. “That’s easy,” he replied, “You start by making women healthy. The rest will follow.” " http://www.broadagenda.com.au/home/indigenous-women-and-the-hidden-health-gap/
Week 11- The Social Construction of Sexual Relationships: Impact on Women's HealthPost Feminism
Like anything, the social construction of sex and sexual relationships is a continually evolving and changing thing. Feminism has had huge roles in changing the way women are viewed in sexual relationships and is still changing today. When Dr Clare Moran brought up the idea of Postfeminism during the lecture and asked us for examples, I immediately thought of a video I had seen just the day before on Facebook.
It made me feel totally sick to the stomach that women are not only thinking like this but teaching their young girls their ways. Whatever I think about it though, it doesn't change the fact that this is a real thing and women world wide are using their sexuality as a commodity. Many women have to turn to sex work for countless different reasons but many women, like the one featured in the clip above prove that they have turned 'sugaring' into a multi-million dollar career. As someone who probably doesn't fit into any one category of feminist, the idea of postfeminism sort of makes me a little angry. I understand everyone is entitled to their own opinion and that for some women, Feminism has achieved what it needed too, but now it may be time to step back.
I saw this video on Facebook a while ago and thought of it again when I was writing this reflection. I have valued this unit a lot because now when I look back at these reflections, if there was any inkling of doubt in my mind that we no longer need feminism, I can look back simply at the issues covered in PUB336 and know that there is still a place for feminism in society. Like any group there is always a few extreme people, this includes feminists and anti-feminists, but in a world that is still patriarchally dominated, women who see postfeminism as attractive and moving into even the field of sugar babies, might eventually find that it's not all it cracked up to be. This is the trailer for a documentary about "Sugarbabying" that helped me understand the concept as what it fundamentally is, a transaction, but also of the risks involved.
Week 13 - Three Case Studies: Representatives from Children by Choice, DVConnect and TRUE relationships Women's Health: Falling off a Cliff
This week for our final lecture we had three speakers from three different organisations relevant to women's health. Dr Clare Moran used an analogy to describe the primary prevention work that she is involved in and I thought it was a particularly relevant tie between all three of the topics. "It's like people falling off a cliff, and having an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff to help them after they fall or placing a fence at the top of the cliff to stop them falling in the first place."
The work that True Relationships does is putting the fence around the edge of the cliff in an aim to stop people from falling off. I didn't realise that they started working with kids from prep to begin changing the way that gender is constructed in our society. This idea really resonated with me and I immediately thought of the domestic violence ad campaign done by the Australian Government last year (video below). Clare's thoughts had me reeling about everything that is engrained in boys and girls from the start and how I see these little things come to life everyday, even in my own life. But these stereotypes, thoughts and behaviours are learned behaviours and are particularly difficult to unlearn because they're so deeply woven through our culture.
Putting up a fence around the cliff is something that starts with boys and girls, and men and women, and our society and culture all together, but building this fence is not a fast process and can't be a quick fix. A resource developed by the World Health Organisation (Changing cultural and social norms that support violence, 2009) details the many ways we can begin changing violence norms and even talks about the changes needed in mass media culture to create real deep change.
Unfortunately, a huge group of people have already fallen off the cliff before the fence was even being thought about and there are still people falling through the gaps. This is where DVconnect and Children by Choice often become the ambulance at the bottom. DVconnect in particular does amazing work and it was shocking to hear just how busy they actually are everyday. I wish they didn't have the most traffic out of the organisations we heard from, but the reality is that the people who have been a victim to the cliff that is our cultural and social norms of violence, need help and deserve the same respect, support and care as the people who are still standing at the top of the cliff. Still, some women can't be saved at the bottom of the cliff with on average one woman dying a week from domestic violence in Australia.
Finally, there was still some disheartening content from Children by Choice about the realities that women with unplanned pregnancies in violent relationships or from sexual assault have to face. I thought it was amazing to hear that the only independent organisation giving women with unplanned pregnancies a choice is in Queensland. For a lot of women, I like to think that Children by Choice acts like a net that catches you before you hit the bottom of the cliff. It's one of those organisations that gives women who are faced with being locked into a bad relationship by having the mans child a choice and a chance to get themselves out. "We think of bruises, not pregnant bellies, when we hear domestic abuse, but millions of women are pressured to have kids against their will by partners bent on controlling their bodies." (Gretchen Voss, 2011)
What does it mean to be a lady?
After this weeks class, one of the questions that really stuck with me was what does it mean to be a lady? From the time we are born as a girl, we are groomed into being a lady, but what is a lady? Being a lady is a completely arbitrary concoction of socially constructed ideas and behaviours and for a woman to be considered a ‘lady’, she must abide by these constructs.
I was lucky that my parents raised me to value good manners, but in the exact same way they raised my brother to have good manners. To what extent is having good manners considered being lady-like? Someone who has appeared on several different television shows I have seen recently is June Dally-Watkins, a self-made business woman who is considered the leading lady in fashion and etiquette throughout the ages in Australia. Initially, I thought how wild is this! An old woman telling other women that they are not ‘ladies’ because of the way they eat, sit, or chew gum, that’s crazy. However, one of June’s quotes really resonates with me as I could not agree with it more, “many [young people] don't understand good manners simply means being kind, thoughtful and considerate to other human beings.” However, June’s classes in etiquette would be very different if a male were to take one in comparison to a female.
I also saw in the news this week female golfers outraged as they have been forced to tone down and conform to societal constructs in how they express their own femininity. Female pro golfers now have strict guidelines for what they must wear in competition after officials thought some competitors were wearing hyper-sexualised outfits that had become distracting in competition. How on earth is the female body distracting during elite sporting competitions, are we not admiring the female bodies athleticism? American golfer Paige Spiranac said, “Most likely, this edict was put into place to eliminate the presence of cleavage. In that case, a curvier, fuller-figured woman would be chided and fined far more often than a woman with a smaller bust.” We are taking steps backwards in the fight for equality when we cannot even have equity amongst women in elite sport.
This video is a perspective that makes it all a little more obvious.
Week 3 - Women in Popular Culture, Advertising, and the Media – Implications for Social Inequalities and Women's Health
Strong Women in the Bible
I found it interesting in this weeks lecture that the bible still plays a large role in the construction of gender in society and in the media. With more and more young people leaning towards secular beliefs and falling out of religious practice, it could be seen as strange that the story of Genesis is still informing gender roles in our society. I was raised catholic and studied religion at a catholic school, so I know that women are oppressed in the church in many ways. We cannot step forward as leaders of the church, priests cannot marry a woman, for a long time in history women were even separated from men in the church (and still are in many denominations). Women of faith have made little inroads in the fight for equality. However, with the presence of strong women in the media slowly increasing, many people look past the handful of strong women in the bible as role models for modern females.
The most well-known story right from childhood is the story of Genesis and unfortunately this is the story that most likely resonates the most with men and subconsciously informs women of their ‘role’ in society. What about strong women like Ruth, Miriam, Mary and Mary Magdalene? These women have little screen time in the bible so to speak, but play a massive role in how the entire story plays out. Without these women, Christianity as we know it would not exist.
In a time when women were still outcasts in society simply because of their most basic bodily functions, Mary falling pregnant as a virgin would have been unbelievably difficult to come to terms with. If Mary had not have been recently married to Joseph and spontaneously fell pregnant, she would have been outcast from society or killed. Even Joseph planned to "send her away privately" (Matthew 1:19), meaning divorce her after he found out she was pregnant. Mary was on track to be a pregnant virgin, outcast from her community because of it and then have to raise a child alone and she took it all in her stride. Obviously the bible offers little detail on her pregnancy itself, but we know what came of it. She had to give birth in a stable, it’s a miracle that she even survived childbirth, but she did and she went on to become one of the most important characters in Christianity. A woman. Someone who should be admired for being an absolute trooper, but she isn’t appreciated nearly enough, because that’s just what women do.
I think that it is easy to see a link between how women are portrayed in the bible for the most part, and how this plays a part in the construction of women in popular culture and media. In saying this, it is up to us to build the link between the strong women we see in the bible and strong women that are most certainly there in the media, just not in the spotlight.
Week 4 - The 'Right Time' to have a child: Changing Trends in Child Bearing and Rearing
Pregnancy throughout Generations
Listening to this weeks lecture, I found it difficult to relate to because at this stage in my life, pregnancy, child birth and raising a child aren't even on my radar. I keep thinking, how could anyone my age (19) be in a position where they feel ready and prepared to care for a child. I don't mean this in a judgmental way at all, I'm just at a point in my life where I can't even comprehend planning pregnancy later on in life, let alone an unplanned pregnancy now, I can't even look after myself at the moment! But then I keep seeing girls who I graduated school with who are overjoyed because they have fallen pregnant, and I'm happy that they're happy, of course I wonder how on earth they are going to do it but I'm happy for them. Then I see that one of them has been kicked out of home because of it, is unemployed and the father of her child is also between jobs and it scares me. On the other end of the spectrum, another one of these girls has full support from her parents, they're even possibly happier than she is.
Then I see how different my life would be if I was born in another country, especially a developing country. I would probably have multiple children by now, after being married early. I would be counting my blessings that I survived pregnancy and child birth. But I wouldn't necessarily be upset about it, because that's the way things are in my culture, and I wasn't expected to do anything other than fall into motherhood at an early age.
It's hard to predict what my generations attitude towards pregnancy will be, whether we wish to start a family relatively young or wait and see how far we go in the workforce before having children. For my mother, she had her first child fairly young compared to all her friends but not necessarily young at all nowadays. My eldest brother is 2.5 years older than many of my mums friends' eldest children. This changed the way that mum was living her life, as pregnancy does, but she always tells me how she was working up until her due date for my brother (he was 10 days overdue), and for her fourth and last pregnancy she was playing basketball at 8 months pregnant. She still got to finish her degree and work for a few years before having her first child, something that many women these days don't get. I know that my mum is a great role model in showing that life doesn't have to change drastically once you fall pregnant. She went against the status quo by continuing to work full-time from home while she had 2 kids at school and 2 at home with her. Then once all the kids were in school she decided that she wanted a change so she went back to university and studied full-time with 4 kids under the age of 13.
Then I think of my grandmothers, both of whom I am lucky to still have around. My mothers mother did not complete high school (not unusual for her generation), had 2 children in her twenties and no longer worked full time, and only ever worked part time in the family business afterwards. My fathers mother had 5 children again in her twenties, she did not work while the kids were young, but is still working full time to this day. Neither have university degrees or year 12 education.
What was normal for them, is nowhere near 'normal' for me. Of course this is going to be different for the woman next to me and the woman next to her. It's going to be different for girls in different regions in Australia let alone around the world.
For me it was never a question whether I would finish high school and go to university, my parents never forced this on me, that's just how my mum did it, so I have never thought otherwise about how I might do it. However, for those girls that I graduated with, it's quite likely that their mothers were in a similar situation to what they are in now, so it's not unusual for them at all to be pregnant or considering pregnancy. Cultural trends and socio-economic status impact pregnancy and motherhood in some amazing ways and it's interesting to see how these changes have evolved and how they are going to continue evolving in the future.
Week 5 - Changing Gender Roles in Families: Paid work, house work, and child-raising.
Changing Dad's, Changing Mum's ... Right?
A lot of the content in this weeks lecture did not come as a surprise to me. I went to an all girls high school where empowering women was a large focus in all areas of school life. We had an entire year 12 English unit just on feminism where we covered the roles of women in families, the workplace and society in general, so the disparity between men and women was not news to me. Even before this, I think this mindset of women being inferior to men especially in the workplace is deeply engrained in our society. My sister had always dreamed of being an orthopaedic surgeon, since birth she has spent a lot of time with her own orthopaedic surgeon. When she was actually starting to plan her path towards becoming one, her surgeon who had become a close family friend told her that he did not want to see her in a mans world where she probably wouldn't ever be able to achieve what she is capable of, simply because she's a woman. If she chooses to have children, her professional life will be severely compromised in comparison to her male counterparts who are using that time as hugely important times of growth and development. She would be left in the rear vision mirror, not to mention the alleged 'great difference' in strength between male and female orthopaedic surgeons. This struck a chord with me.
Lately, I have been noticing changes in the role of the 'dad'. Compared to my father who was by no means absent in my childhood but certainly did not play as large a role in child-raising as my Mum, these modern fathers are changing the status quo. I worked at a shoe store during two 'Back to School' periods, which are a great time to understand different families operating like well-oiled or barely moving machines. I saw lots of what my mum likes to call 'Designer Dad's'. These are dads who are greatly involved in the child-raising roles in the family. Dad's who will walk in the park pushing a twin pram with the dog tied to it and another child strapped onto their chest and a coffee in one hand. It's actually an amazing image to see, I certainly don't have enough coordination for all that. It was dad's who would come in and be totally in charge of purchasing all the kids school shoes (a rather difficult task at times) then they would be off to collect school uniforms and books and drop them into school while meeting the teachers the next week. This is certainly a changing dynamic, evolving in recent years.
So why have we seen little to no changes in the gender pay gap. I find it really hard to accept that men are being encouraged to be stay at home dads while their wives/partners are encouraged to go back into the workforce quickly and yet we are seeing little reward for these women. Again, for every action there should be an equal and opposite reaction, for every woman who moves into the workforce after having a child, we should see benefits in pay, and in opportunities, because it's a pretty rough gig. 'The Intern' is a recent move that looks at the struggles of working mothers. She's running her own company and her husband decides he needs to start cheating on her because his manhood is threatened, she's more successful than him which neither him nor the community around them like. I'm finding that a lot of things I see these days are different because of this unit, something I don't mind, but very interesting.
Week 6 - Domestic Violence
Domestic Violence - Women, Men, Children and Change
Thinking back on this weeks lecture, it is hard to pick one concept that stuck with me, I think anything to do with domestic violence is uncomfortable to really think about because it's an uncomfortable topic. The more I research it and think about it, the more grateful I am that I have not been directly impacted by it yet. I say yet because the statistics are overwhelmingly against me simply based on age and gender.
There are countless organisations and campaigns out there trying to change the rates of domestic violence and the relationship between men and women in violent or conflict based relationships. Many are targeted at men, asking them to make a change and many are targeted at the general public asking them to avoid becoming bystanders in domestic violence. Some are targeted at professionals in different fields who may be in a position to help women and men caught up in domestic violence, but there are little asking women to make a change. I wanted to look into this to see why this might be, but now I know there are so many more factors involved than simply just 'leaving'.
I am a big 'Survivor' fan and I won't miss an episode of it. Thinking about domestic violence victims in this way has helped me try to gain an understanding of what it may be like in that situation. (NB. I use life here metaphorically, as in life in the game of survivor) First of all, you are not the only one involved in the situation and your life is in the hands of the people around you. Everyone on Survivor are sitting ducks and without a carefully planned and executed manipulation of events, you won't get to the end of the game. It is not as simple as going in and establishing yourself as the best player in the game, as you will quickly find that many people find this threatening and will quickly dispose of you, it's a dangerous play to put yourself out there. Similarly, when people who say, "It would only take one time and I'd be out of there!" about domestic and family violence, don't understand that it's not that simple and to get yourself to the end game safely, there are many complex decisions to be made considering, your own safety and wellbeing, and the safety and wellbeing of your children or other family members.
I saw the above video on my Facebook feed a little while ago and found it again when I was thinking about DV and Survivor. As public health practitioners there isn't a lot we can do except be a pillar of support. An often frustrating job, but extremely important in the entire scheme of things. This campaign encourages not just health practitioners but everyone to listen, not just to what they are actually saying but what they are actually meaning. It's a great video to understand just how creative some women in violent situations have to be, but also how important it is that our ears are actually open to interpret this creativity.
Week 7 - Womens Health in Same-Sex Relationships
"Women Can't Hurt Each other"
This weeks content was quite shocking for me. I was completely aware of the struggles that homosexual women face socially, but I wasn't aware of how many different hurdles they come across in their health and wellbeing. After this I wanted to look further into the poor representation of women in same-sex relationships in health promotion. What I found most interesting was that research estimates that 25% to 33% of LGBT relationships are abusive (which is the approximately the same as heterosexual statistics) (Brown University, 2015). Yet there are next to no specific services provided for women in same sex abusive relationships. Many women think that because they are not legally married they cannot claim domestic violence has occurred. This is not true but is a significant barrier in victims seeking help. What really upsets me is that what is advertised as a safe space for women in abusive relationships are often women's shelters. These shelters are gender sensitive but do not account for the fact that a victims abusive partner in a same-sex relationship can still gain access to these shelters. Lesbian women are either offered health care for heterosexual women or are offered very little health care at all, with some health practitioners assuming that they don't need the same level of sexual health care for example, which is completely false. Similarly, many women who report abuse in a same-sex relationship feel as though their reports are not taken seriously because another women is not capable of hurting someone like a man. They face these attitudes from people who should be a pillar of support for them.
The short film above is an award winning short film that depicts an abusive same sex relationship. I think that while it shows some of the barriers that lesbian women face in this situation, I believe that it could have depicted some of the more challenging barriers that are faced by these women such as the discrimination faced or the fact that their partners may be holding them back by threatening to out their sexual orientation, HIV status or even losing your identity outside of that relationship. Again, the assumption that women can't or won't physically hurt other women like men can, is very dangerous for homosexual women. Many think that their friends and family won't take them seriously because of these stereotypes and preconceived thoughts. I hope that soon public health practitioners can begin building support networks for these women. Some people think that marriage equality is the last step in achieving true equality, but there is so much more that needs to change. Until lesbian women have equal access to basic health care, feel comfortable even holding hands in public and receive the same reaction and help they need in abusive relationships we have a LONG way to go.
Week 8 - Mental Health & Substance Abuse in Women Across the Ages
Addiction: A woman in a man's world...
I have to say I wasn't overly surprised by the re-emerging trend of housewives and substance abuse and even working women and substance abuse. To me it's the most intense job in the world, you don't ever even get a break, there's no weekends to relax and there isn't any paid leave, nor do you have a team of coworkers to share the load with when you're a mum. For me even babysitting is stressful and I'm being PAID!
After this weeks lecture I went home and spoke to my Mum about her thoughts on the topic. Mum is a high school teacher and she was immediately engaged when I started talking to her about it. She said that she was totally gobsmacked when she saw a study showing that the fastest growing demographic of substance abusers is middle aged women. A lot of her job in an all girls school is about empowering young women to avoid a lifestyle where they rely on drugs and alcohol either for fun or to get them through each day. But what people don't realise is that women battling addiction, especially mothers and working women, are already disadvantaged when seeking help and treatment. Journalist and recovering addict, Jenny Valentish has recently written a book, 'Woman of Substances' which is a memoir/research project. She says, "I wanted to write about the female experience because there's a norm across society today, and men are that norm."
"Everything about addiction, from the way we talk about it to the way that it is treated, is tailored to men's experience."
Seeing this work from someone having both the perspective of looking from the inside out and from the outside in, I wanted to see more of Jenny Valentish's story. I wanted to include this quote because I believe this sums up what I couldn't articulate because I had never really looked at it like this but it is so true. She explains, "Men's addiction stories are often framed as tales of daring, whereas women's drinking and substance abuse is seen as 'sad' or 'irresponsible', especially if you're a mum". In popular media culture, working men and middle/upperclass fathers struggling with abuse are shown as being bold and undaunted and maybe shown as a little guilty. But women? Mothers? Working women battling addiction? These women's stories are represented as pitiful and totally wrong, "how is she fit to be looking after children?"
I thought this was a really clever video having a poke at the unrealistic advertising approaches towards women's health. We are treated like robots! Has much changed since the 1950's housewife boom? Under the surface I don't think so, we are still targeted as though we are crazy and that a simple drug will "fix you". I think this is how and why women get caught in the trap of substance abuse so easily. First it becomes an easy escape from societies pressures to conform; feel a certain way, look a certain way, behave in a certain way. Then it becomes the ultimate numbing of the painful reality that women are exposed to. We aren't men. 30-59% of women with a substance abuse problem have experienced some kind of trauma in their past, often sexual abuse, and yet women who find the courage to face societal stigma and judgement in asking for help with their addiction, are asked to be part of an AA meeting sitting next to a man. Women with young children can't access rehabilitation services without having to find somewhere for the kids to go and heaven forbid people found out where she was going while the kids were being babysat. It's these kinds of attitudes that are detrimental to women's mental health and are what is trapping women in a never ending spiral of addiction.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-06-11/woman-of-substances-jenny-valentish-womens-addiction/8603796
That is the link to an article written about Jenny Valentish's book and some of her perspectives on the issue which was a really interesting read.
Week 9 - The Fashion Industry And Body Image: Impact On Women's Health
13 going on 30
Going to an all girls school, I think once a year we would have an external speaker come in and speak to us about body image, the media and the fashion industry. At the time it seemed a bit trivial. One year I would be thinking, I'll never be impacted by this, I'm not that naive, and then the next year I would be totally shocked by how relevant and scary it all was. It seemed the older I got, the more hyperaware I became of just how vulnerable young women are to body image issues. After this lecture, it became clear that it's not something that just affects young girls, unrealistic and totally ridiculous expectations are thrust upon women of every age.
The video of the human Barbie Doll I had seen before, but for some reason when I watched it this time it scared me. Before I thought it was funny... yes, ridiculous...definitely! Now, in the context of everything we have looked at so far in this unit, it really upset me that this woman has decided that she's happiest with herself when she looks fake. What upset me more, was the reaction of the morning show hosts at the end of the clip. Reactions like that are why women can't feel comfortable in who they are, and when they try to conform to what it is that society asks for, they are body shamed and laughed at for their idea of beauty.
Week 10 - The Health of Australian Indigenous Women: What are the Key Challenges?
Black White Woman
Although this week we missed out on an actual lecture due to a public holiday, I was really interested by the materials on Blackboard on this topic so I wanted to look a bit further into the issue. Any Public Health unit will tell you about the extreme disparities between the health of white australians and Indigenous Australians. The health gap is astonishing. Until now though, I had never really thought about the role that women play in this. I found a video that was made as a comedy but I think that the discomfort I felt watching this clip is a true indicator of the discomfort everyone should feel about how we treat Indigenous women in a health sense.
Yes, it's supposed to be a funny exaggeration but I think that the statistics showing the health gaps between White and Indigenous women paint the exact same picture. Apparently, we face starkly different health battles to each other. Yet, health practitioners seem to have no issue with how obviously uncomfortable Indigenous women feel when white women attempt to be one of them, it simply doesn't work that way.
The mini-documentary in the clip above shows the much greater fight that Indigenous women are fighting with domestic violence in the shadow of white women. The first 20 seconds of this video though was the most eye opening for me.
"Our issues are continually discussed by people who have no link to them whatsoever."
Aboriginal women have been left behind in women's health advances over time as they have been fighting for basic human rights and now they are suffering the consequences. Obstetrician Stephen Robson seems to think that in a cultural sense, improving Aboriginal women's health is the key to improving population health.
"The statistics presented and the picture painted for the assembled group was disheartening. The gap between the health of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians seemed too great to bridge.
Discouraged, I asked one of the senior presenters where we could even start to help, to put things right. “That’s easy,” he replied, “You start by making women healthy. The rest will follow.” "
http://www.broadagenda.com.au/home/indigenous-women-and-the-hidden-health-gap/
Week 11- The Social Construction of Sexual Relationships: Impact on Women's HealthPost Feminism
Like anything, the social construction of sex and sexual relationships is a continually evolving and changing thing. Feminism has had huge roles in changing the way women are viewed in sexual relationships and is still changing today. When Dr Clare Moran brought up the idea of Postfeminism during the lecture and asked us for examples, I immediately thought of a video I had seen just the day before on Facebook.
It made me feel totally sick to the stomach that women are not only thinking like this but teaching their young girls their ways. Whatever I think about it though, it doesn't change the fact that this is a real thing and women world wide are using their sexuality as a commodity. Many women have to turn to sex work for countless different reasons but many women, like the one featured in the clip above prove that they have turned 'sugaring' into a multi-million dollar career. As someone who probably doesn't fit into any one category of feminist, the idea of postfeminism sort of makes me a little angry. I understand everyone is entitled to their own opinion and that for some women, Feminism has achieved what it needed too, but now it may be time to step back.
I saw this video on Facebook a while ago and thought of it again when I was writing this reflection. I have valued this unit a lot because now when I look back at these reflections, if there was any inkling of doubt in my mind that we no longer need feminism, I can look back simply at the issues covered in PUB336 and know that there is still a place for feminism in society. Like any group there is always a few extreme people, this includes feminists and anti-feminists, but in a world that is still patriarchally dominated, women who see postfeminism as attractive and moving into even the field of sugar babies, might eventually find that it's not all it cracked up to be. This is the trailer for a documentary about "Sugarbabying" that helped me understand the concept as what it fundamentally is, a transaction, but also of the risks involved.
Week 13 - Three Case Studies: Representatives from Children by Choice, DVConnect and TRUE relationships
Women's Health: Falling off a Cliff
This week for our final lecture we had three speakers from three different organisations relevant to women's health. Dr Clare Moran used an analogy to describe the primary prevention work that she is involved in and I thought it was a particularly relevant tie between all three of the topics.
"It's like people falling off a cliff, and having an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff to help them after they fall or placing a fence at the top of the cliff to stop them falling in the first place."
The work that True Relationships does is putting the fence around the edge of the cliff in an aim to stop people from falling off. I didn't realise that they started working with kids from prep to begin changing the way that gender is constructed in our society. This idea really resonated with me and I immediately thought of the domestic violence ad campaign done by the Australian Government last year (video below). Clare's thoughts had me reeling about everything that is engrained in boys and girls from the start and how I see these little things come to life everyday, even in my own life. But these stereotypes, thoughts and behaviours are learned behaviours and are particularly difficult to unlearn because they're so deeply woven through our culture.
Putting up a fence around the cliff is something that starts with boys and girls, and men and women, and our society and culture all together, but building this fence is not a fast process and can't be a quick fix. A resource developed by the World Health Organisation (Changing cultural and social norms that support violence, 2009) details the many ways we can begin changing violence norms and even talks about the changes needed in mass media culture to create real deep change.
Unfortunately, a huge group of people have already fallen off the cliff before the fence was even being thought about and there are still people falling through the gaps. This is where DVconnect and Children by Choice often become the ambulance at the bottom. DVconnect in particular does amazing work and it was shocking to hear just how busy they actually are everyday. I wish they didn't have the most traffic out of the organisations we heard from, but the reality is that the people who have been a victim to the cliff that is our cultural and social norms of violence, need help and deserve the same respect, support and care as the people who are still standing at the top of the cliff. Still, some women can't be saved at the bottom of the cliff with on average one woman dying a week from domestic violence in Australia.
Finally, there was still some disheartening content from Children by Choice about the realities that women with unplanned pregnancies in violent relationships or from sexual assault have to face. I thought it was amazing to hear that the only independent organisation giving women with unplanned pregnancies a choice is in Queensland. For a lot of women, I like to think that Children by Choice acts like a net that catches you before you hit the bottom of the cliff. It's one of those organisations that gives women who are faced with being locked into a bad relationship by having the mans child a choice and a chance to get themselves out.
"We think of bruises, not pregnant bellies, when we hear domestic abuse, but millions of women are pressured to have kids against their will by partners bent on controlling their bodies." (Gretchen Voss, 2011)