• 12Aug

    Nauru

    The Guardian recently published leaked documents of hundreds of pages of abuse and sexual assault of women and children on Nauru’s off-shore refugee detention centre. Much of this abuse appears to have been at the hands of the Wilson’s security guards at the facility.

    There have been articles since condemning the Australian government’s treatment of asylum seekers and its blatant disregard of these abuses, such as that written by Jennifer Wilson.

    The Immigration Minister, Mr. Peter Dutton’s response to the publication of the leaked files was:

    “some people do have a motivation to make a false complaint”…”I have been made aware of some incidents that have reported false allegations of sexual assault,” 

    Whilst our focus must be on stopping our government for perpetuating such abuse on women and children, women and children who are fleeing from horrific wars and violence in their own countries, it is also important to put this in the context of the patriarchal world that we live in.

    It is all based on patriarchal ideology, where white men with power see the rest of the world as the ‘other’, as less than human and therefore unworthy of our concern. As Denise Thompson writes:

      It is about male domination.

    And women and children are always the victims of the oppression of male domination: sexual abuse, violence…and if you are not of the white man’s race then you are doubly open to white male domination and abuse. Women and children refugees are especially vulnerable to exploitation and abuse – and it is happening all over the world.

    Of course Peter Dutton would rely on the persistent mantra that allegations of sexual assault are false, because patriarchy has created the fictitious doctrine that women lie about sexual assault. They come up with many reasons why women make up false allegations. In this instance, their motivation apparently is to seek refuge in Australia.

    Basically when you live in patriarchy as a woman then you are a liar, a manipulator, a vindictive woman. Your motivations are always suspect.

    It’s not the first time the Liberal National government has used this line when allegations of horrendous abuse on the off-shore detention centres have come to light.

    In a previous blog I wrote of the horrific conditions where refugees are being detained in off-shore facilities and the abuse that was being brought to light. In that particular instance the motivation was politically motivated and designed to discredit the off-shore processing policy.

    “Every aspect of the detention of these people has been designed to humiliate and demean.

    So it is no surprise that in such an environment those in charge will abuse their power and sexually abuse women and children.

    And Scott Morrison, on behalf of the Australian government has responded in a typically patriarchal pattern.

    “The public don’t want to be played for mugs with allegations being used as some sort of political tactic in all of this.”

    “However, we note that the allegations by Senator Hanson-Young have been made publicly and in the context of broader political statements to discredit the government’s involvement in offshore processing.”” 

    “Dutton well knows that the government’s own Moss review confirmed the reports of physical and sexual abuse that were uncovered in 2014. That review also exonerated the Save The Children staff who were the authors of many of the reports.” Refugee Action group 

     

    It is a common occurrence in our legal system as well – to label women as liars.

    Rape is the “most under-reported of serious offences”  for that very reason.

    And yet the reality is – rape is common:

    “One in three women will be sexually assaulted at some time in their lives”  (Fergusson & Mullen, 1999).

    By men.

    And yet they are not believed.

    “Police statistics reveal that ‘false’ reporting of sexual assault is minimal, representing 2% to 7% of all reported assaults. These statistics also include statements withdrawn by victim/survivors due to fear of revenge and the impact of the legal system.”

    “1 in 6 reports to Police of rape and less than 1 in 7 reports of incest or sexual penetration of a child result in prosecution (Victorian Law Reform Commission, Sexual Offences: Final Report, 2004)” 

     

    Women’s experiences of the court system often as traumatic as their rape when they are accused of making vindictive allegations; of ‘asking for it’.

    As Caitlin Roper has written:

    “My friend sat in court day after day, forced to recount, in excruciating detail, her experience of being groomed, manipulated, and eventually sexually assaulted by a predator 30 years her senior, over a period of 18 months. She then endured a vicious cross examination as her wealthy boss’s QC top lawyer tried to tear her apart and assassinate her character for more than two full days. She teased and seduced him, he argued. She made it all up. They had a consensual sexual relationship. She was obsessed with him — her balding boss, old enough to be her father — despite having a boyfriend (now her husband). John’s lawyer even argued her claims were financially motivated and said she was punishing the accused for refusing to buy her an extravagant apartment.” 

    And it happens in the family law system too. Parental alienation syndrome is premised on the same ideology that women lie about rape and sexual abuse.

    PAS is grounded in misogynistic views and reflects a mother-blaming ideology. This ideology persists within the family law system, enabling men to continue to abuse women and children at will, with no protection from the legal system.

    However when it suits their needs, men will make their own allegations of abuse and violence and nothing says it more clearly than the child sexual abuse reported to be occurring in Northern Territory aboriginal communities. When it suits their political ends, they can demonise and punish a vulnerable, marginalised population and make vicious claims of ‘dysfunction’ within that community.

    Dutton says these current allegations of sexual assault in off-shore detention are not based on fact and yet when let’s compare the response that led to NT intervention, as I have written in a previous blog

    “In 2007, the federal government staged a massive intervention in the Northern Territory on the basis of the report, “Little Children are Sacred” as a result of a government inquiry into child sexual abuse in the Northern Territory.

    “The fall-out was a full-scale, (including army), intervention which resulted in the reinforcement of the unwavering, systemic stealing of children from their arms, to who knows where? The Department of Childrens Services have lost the files on some 8,000 children who are thus just “disappeared”.”

    The intervention in fact has done little to address child sexual abuse or violence against women.

    It is horrendous that our white male politicians use (abuse) the concept of protection women and children from violence and abuse for their own ends – mining of traditional lands is a suspect in this – whilst they go about destroying lives and communities.”

     

    So men can rape at will – at the personal level, in our own homes, in our neighbourhoods – and at the State level where they lock up innocent women and children seeking refuge from violence in their own countries and knowingly expose them to violence and sexual assault.

    There is no recourse for women – patriarchal law does not protect them; does not prosecute abusers; does not believe women.

    we will never be silenced

    Yes Peter Dutton must go.

    His behaviour and attitude is callous, cruel, racist and misogynistic.

    But he is not the only one. Both major parties in Australia are responsible for the on-going mistreatment and cruelty towards vulnerable women and children refugees.

    We must hold them to account.

    This is unacceptable.

    roy

    There are a number of organisations which are challenging the Government’s refugee policies.

    I urge every Australian to take action and stop this horrendous victimisation of innocent women and children.

    Australian Women in Support of Women on Nauru

    Let Them Stay

    Grandmothers against Detention of Refugee Children

    Nauru files – Public Actions

     

  • 30Dec

     

    Suffragette_poster

     

    I had the privilege of seeing this film yesterday. I thought it was brilliant. My heart was in my mouth for most of the film, and by the end when they showed the real footage of women marching in white and purple at the funeral of Emily Davison (Natalie Press) the tears were running down my face.

    Suffragette_film_v_3430096b

    One of the most pleasing aspects of the film was that it was centred on a working class woman, Maud Watts (Carey Mulligan). I always had the impression that the Suffragette movement, particularly in Britain, was a middle class white movement. So it was interesting and informative to see it from a working class woman’s perspective. I understand that she is a fictional character so was interested to learn more about working class women and the suffrage movement and came across this article by Missjones4history:

    “The working class, working women who became involved in the suffragette movement have, for the most part, been written out of history. A fact which is astounding considering the hurdles the working class women had to jump in order to secure their right to an involvement in politics.” 

    She writes about the  women of the Lancashire Cotton Mills.

    “ At the turn of the twentieth century, working women increasingly found their work, and their right to work under attack from the ever increasing, male dominated trade unions who wanted to protect jobs for men. They therefore began to organise themselves into unions to protect their rights in the work place and to campaign for the enfranchisement of women. An example of this is the Manchester and Salford Women’s Trade and Labour Council…”

    “In terms of an organised suffrage movement, the working women of Lancashire have been called the ‘original inspiration’ behind the formation of the Woman’s Social and Political Union, the WSPU, infamously known as the militant suffragettes.[4] This was due to a petition that the North of England Society organised, a petition for female enfranchisement; signed exclusively by women working in the textile industry of the North West. By the spring of 1901, the petition was taken to Westminster containing 29, 359 signatures; Mr Taylor, the MP for Radcliffe said that he’d heard of bigger petitions, but had ‘never seen a larger one’.[5] This petition aroused the active interest in the suffrage movement among working women, an interest which was to make many women politically active, a role hard to fulfil taking into account the many different roles a working woman already had.”

    This article, as does the film, highlights the great sacrifices that working class women in particular, made to fight for their rights.

    Maud Watts was born and worked from the age of seven in a laundry. The scenes in the laundry highlight how difficult these conditions were. She is also, as a young child, subjected to sexual abuse by her employer, who continues to sexually abuse the girls in the factory.

    We also see domestic violence when Violet Miller (Anne-Marie Duff) arrives to give evidence in Parliament with a battered face. There is no horror or shock at this from the other women – an acceptance that this male violence is a part of their lives.

    Violet also withdraws from the most violent acts of the activism, because she is pregnant. In the scene with Maud, she cries – she is worried that she will be unable to cope with yet another child. An example of the lack of options for women in controlling their own fertility. And a reminder that this is still a large issue for women all over the world today, even in our so-called progressive Western countries.

    I was astounded at the level of violence meted out to the women as they demonstrated and held rallies. They were beaten, kicked, belted with police trugeons. And then the mounted police would move in and trample the women with their horses.

    It also showed the humiliation the women experienced when placed in prison – strip searched and demeaned – something that women prisoners continue to be subjected to today.

    And the torture involved in force feeding the women was horrific to watch.  The missjones article argues that this violence was more extreme for working class women:

    “Despite official lines stating that all women were treated the same by the authorities, regardless of social background; it soon became apparent that this was not the case. It was noticed that middle class and upper class suffragettes were receiving preferential treatment, for example, if they resisted being fed, they would only be force fed a few times before being released. On the other hand, the working class suffragettes, who the prison authorities thought to be anonymous, were often subjected to the torture of force feeding on a daily basis for the full term of their sentence.”

    The sacrifices that Maud was forced to make to continue her activism is heart-breaking. She is kicked out of her home by her husband – for bringing shame and social stigma to the family. She loses her son. He is her husband’s property and so he is able to determine that she is not to have contact with him. In another painful scene she is confronted with the fact that her husband has given him up for adoption. A memorable quote to her son

    “Your mother’s name is Maud Watts.”

    Whilst the laws around custodial rights to children have changed since then, I have written extensively about how the family law system continues to punish ‘bad mothers’ and privilege fathers’ rights. https://mairivoice.femininebyte.org/the-fault-that-is-family-law-part-1/

    The film has been criticised for its whitewashing of the suffrage movement and its lack of inclusion of women of colour.

    “Britain was a white society in the main,” Dr Bartley tells me, “and the movement reflected that.” Dr Sumita Mukherjee, a fellow at King’s College London researching Indian suffragettes, notes that the women’s suffrage movement in Britain was “very different from the American case or the Australian case or the New Zealand case, because although there were ethnic minorities in Britain at that time, there wasn’t the same scale or the same questions of citizenship as there were in other countries”. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/11914757/Racism-and-the-suffragettes-the-uncomfortable-truth.html

    Anna Leszkiewicz  has written an interesting article about the composition of the British suffrage movement.

    “Anita Anand, author of Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary, tells me that there were women of colour working alongside more famous white suffragettes, most notably the subject of her book, the Indian princess Sophia Duleep Singh. “There were many overlaps between the Indian suffrage movement and the British suffrage movement. Sophia Duleep Singh had every reason to hate the British. They had taken everything from her: her father’s kindgom, wealth, future, everything. But she believed in this sisterhood, and she sacrificed everything to fight for British women’s vote, and also then fought for Indian women’s emancipation as well.””

    asian_suffragettes

    Dr Mukherjee adds:

    “There’s a popular image of Indian women in 1911 involved in a suffragette procession [see above]: they were Indian women living in Britain at the time living with their families. What’s interesting about that photo is that they’re part of a procession campaigning for the vote for British women, but in that procession they had an Empire section with Australian women, New Zealand women and Indian women. British suffragettes tried to convince women from other areas of the British Empire that if they got the vote, they could look after Indian women and other women in the other communes of Britain.

    “There’s an implication that white women felt they were more able to speak for Indian women than Indian women themselves. So although I’m not sure I’d say it’s overtly racist, it is imperialist.”

    This article also briefly raises the issue of lesbian women in the movement, which the film fails to address. An issue which has been controversial in women’s movement then and since.

    “There are many other suggestions of gay relationships within the movement, including Mary Blathwayt herself, Christabel Pankhurst, and Dame Ethel Smythe. “Dame Ethel had realised early on in life that she loved women, not men, and was fairly bold about things,” Pugh adds.”

    Whilst the list of when women were given the right to vote in different countries at the end of the film was informative it should be noted that this really does not cover the full picture. For example in South Australia until 1973 the Legislative Council vote was available to any person who owned, rented or leased any dwelling house(thus excluding many women who did not own property) and it excluded joint occupiers, which effectively allowed only one vote to a married couple, disenfranchising one partner – inevitably the woman. It was not until the 1975 elections that voting for the Legislative Council was open to all adults.

    Aboriginal Australians have had full voting rights at all levels of government in Australia only since the 1960s.

    Aboriginal Australians had first begun to acquire voting rights along with other adults living in the Australian colonies from the late-19th century.[1] Other than in Queensland and Western Australia, Aboriginal men were not excluded from voting alongside their non-indigenous counterparts in the Australian colonies and in South Australia, Aboriginal women also acquired the vote from 1895 onward.

    Following Australian Federation in 1901 however, the Commonwealth Franchise Act 1902 restricted Aboriginal voting rights in federal elections. For a time Aborigines could vote in some states and not in others, though from 1949, Aborigines could vote if they were or had been servicemen. In 1962, the Menzies Government (1949-1966) amended the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 to enable all Aboriginal Australians to enroll to vote in Australian federal elections. In 1965, Queensland became the last state to remove restrictions on Aborigines voting in state elections. By 1967 Aborigines had equal rights in all states and territories.

    So the film had flaws. But this does not prevent me from feeling great admiration for the strength and courage of these suffragettes.

    I was also struck by how the film raised issues for women that are still relevant to our struggle today – violence against women; child sexual abuse; poverty; women’s rights to birth control and abortion; lack of economic parity and independence; lesbian visibility and freedom from discrimination. All these issues remain significant to real freedom from oppression for women.

    This film acts as a commemoration to all the women throughout history who have sacrificed, who have shown strength and courage, who have given up their lives for the freedom of women everywhere. As the film quotes Emily Pankhurst:

     “Never surrender. Never give up the fight.”

  • 24Dec

    xmas

    I’m wishing you all a Merry Christmas – because that is part of my history and culture. Although I am an atheist, I was fortunate to grow up in a happy nuclear family and Christmas has always been a time of love and warmth for me.

    But for those who don’t celebrate Christmas I wish you a happy and safe holiday.

    Christmas is not happy for everyone. For many women it evokes memories of trauma and abuse. For many women and children the patriarchal nuclear family is the site of male violence and abuse. For those of you who were physically and/or sexually abused as a child; those of you who witnessed male violence against your mother and whose Christmas time is fraught with distressing and painful memories, I wish you a safe and peaceful holiday.

    trauma tree

    https://heathershelpers.org/2015/12/16/trauma-and-christmas/

    As a result many women are ostracized or  estranged from their families and face a lonely and isolated time. I send you much love at this time.

    There are many women and children who continue to face trauma and abuse at this time of year. The holiday season sees an increase in calls for help from women facing male violence from their partners. May you find safety at this time and I hope that the support services that are so desperately needed are available to you.

    Picture1

    Many women face Christmas without their children. Children who may be forced to visit or live with their abusive fathers. May you have the strength to continue to fight to protect your children and provide them with the support and love they need.

    wsas

    There are also women, particularly indigenous women,  whose children have been forcibly removed from their care because of the racist and misogynistic policies of our society. May you have the support of the community behind you to give you strength and love at this time.

                                                      cropped-GmarMcGrady

    It is a difficult time for incarcerated women who are often locked up for reasons of poverty and male violence.

    sisters inside

    https://www.sistersinside.com.au/

    And our refugee women who as a result of our draconian and inhumane policies are facing years of imprisonment, degradation and assault in their bid to flee from war, violence and abuse. Be aware that whilst our government is enacting such inhuman treatment, many Australians are advocating for change.

    safe_image.php

    I have also been fortunate to have in my life many strong and committed feminists who have given me strength and support over the years. It is important to know that throughout the world women are gathering , meeting, sharing and struggling – across many and varied issues – to end the oppression of women; to end male violence in all its forms; working towards the demise of patriarchal rule.

    So may next year be one of hope, joy and strength as all women continue in their struggles against patriarchy.

    women-hold-up-half-the-sky-annastaysia-savage

  • 10Oct

    Here are a list of articles about the Australian Family Law System.

    These articles have been written over a period of over ten years and may not include any subsequent changes to family law in that time. However, the issues outlined continue to be of relevance for women now.

    Parental Alienation -Fact Sheet

    Fact Sheet 1 Parental alienation

    Family Law         November 2009

    The family law reforms which were made law in July of 2006 have been described as the most significant reforms since 1975. We have considerable concerns about these reforms which we believe take the focus away from the best interests of the child, and place the emphasis on parental rights. In particular it is non-residential parents who potentially have won the greatest gains with these reforms.

    Escaping Gendered Violence: The role of Family Relationship Centres.  Help or Hindrance in Providing Safety for Women and Children      November 2009

    Escaping Gendered Violence

    Myths and Facts               Domestic Violence and Child Abuse in the Context of Separation and Divorce May 2009

    Myths and Facts

    Barriers to Women and Children’s Safety in Family Law system                May 2009

    Barriers to Women and Children’s Safety in Family

    No Escape from Violence: The Silencing of Women and Children                             April 2008

    This article outlines the significant barriers that women and children face when they attempt to escape from male violence within the family and the barriers within the family law system.

    No Escape from Violence presentation

    “Barriers to Safety: Proposed Changes to the Family Law System” April 2006

    This paper examines the proposed reforms to family law as a result of the Government’s inquiry into family law which resulted in the report ‘every picture tells a story’ (2003).

    It is important to examine the political context of these reforms and the political agenda of fathers’ rights groups to gain an understanding of what these reforms are about and how they reflect a right wing shift in political thinking away from creating safety from women and children towards fathers’ rights.

    DVIRC Family Law Forum

    The Relationship Between Child Sexual Abuse, Domestic Violence and Separating Families April 2003

    This paper examines the relationship between child sexual abuse and domestic violence and highlights the research that indicates the coexistence of these two forms of violence in families.

    This paper will examine how the mutual existence of these two forms of abuse impacts on families who are separating. Australian research will be cited which highlight those cases involving all forms of family violence are an integral part of the work of the Family Court. It will be argued that the legal system needs to take into account that both domestic violence and child abuse are significant problems in the separating family and that issues of gender both in the context of child sexual abuse, domestic violence and separating couples are integral to our understanding and the way we deal with these concerns.

    csaconfpaper03

    CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE ALLEGATIONS AND THE FAMILY COURT    February 2003

    A study was conducted at the Adelaide Registry of the Family Court of Australia into 50 cases where child sexual abuse allegations had been made in the context of proceedings before the Family Court. The results of the investigations into the child sexual abuse allegations show that child sexual abuse was confirmed at a similar rate to such allegations made to the South Australian statutory child protection agency. More significantly when specific child sexual abuse allegations are made against fathers, then confirmation rates of child sexual abuse are substantially higher than those in the general population. The results of this study confirm the hypothesis of this thesis that child sexual abuse allegations in the context of Family Court proceedings are not more likely to be false than those in other contexts.

    Child Sexual Abuse and the Family Court

  • 15Jun

    wsas

    It is pleasing that Background Briefing presented a critique of family law last Sunday.

    In the child’s best interests

    In Child best interests
    They were critiquing the way the family court in Australia deals with family law cases.

    “Today, we look at some of the most vexed cases that come before the Family Court; those alleging child sexual abuse. Background Briefing has been contacted by numerous mothers who claim that the Court is biased against parents who raise abuse allegations, and disbelieving of the children who make them. It’s a claim the Family Court rejects.”

    The programme highlighted the reliance that the judiciary places on expert evidence provided by single expert reports in assessing the credibility of the sexual abuse allegations.
    As Professor Patrick Parkinson, a family law and child protection expert and former chairperson of the government advisory group, the Family Law Council points out…

    “The judge has usually no training in child development, no expertise in child development, no expertise in child protection and may have no expertise in family law. Sometimes judges are appointed without any background in family law. The reality is they are highly dependent upon the expert evidence.”

    Parkinson rightly talks of the hierarchy of experts where courts preference psychiatrists.

    “At the bottom of the hierarchy there are social workers.”

    One has to question our meaning of expertise in this context.
    Why is this no surprise? In a highly hierarchical environment such as the law where white upper class men make judgements about all of us, it is not surprise they would preference white male upper class psychiatrists as having more expertise. After all they are likely to reproduce the ideology of class and patriarchal privilege.
    The dilemma of course is that whilst there are no doubt problems with our current child protection system, this is where our current expertise lies.
    In contrast, the father of child psychiatry, Sigmund Freud is infamous for his rejection of the notion of child sexual abuse. Whilst initially propositioning that many of his female clients were victims of child sexual abuse, under threat of ostracism from his professional colleagues, he developed the theory of child sexual abuse fantasies.

    “In 1895, Sigmund Freud formulated what was perhaps his most profound theory: that emotional disturbances in adults stem from actual early traumatic experiences, the knowledge of which has been repressed. But Freud eventually renounced this theory in favor of a new view, that his women patients had “fantasized” their early memories of rape and seduction – a view on which the whole budding science of psychoanalysis would be based.” Jeffrey Masson

    “As a result, most psychiatrists and psychoanalysts have in effect been reluctant to trust the memories of their patients, women in particular, about the traumas they experienced in childhood. Like Freud, they see such traumas as fantasy rather than reality. This cover-up of the truth, Masson asserts, has poisoned the entire profession.”

    As Parkinson points out in the programme:

    “…psychiatry does not provide necessarily very good training for identifying whether a six-year-old child has been sexually abused.”

    The programme interviewed one such psychiatrist, Chris Rikard-Bell and he was true to form.

    “One cannot just depend on what the child’s statements are.”

    He also believes it is important to conduct joint interviews with child and her alleged abuser, the father. The image of a poor child having to face her abuser whilst detailing her abuse is profoundly disturbing. What trauma to put a child through!
    Mr, Rikard-Bell also believes that 90% of allegations raised in family court proceedings are false. A belief he has based on his own biased experience – certainly not on reliable research.
    As Carolyn Quadrio an expert report writer for the Family Court stated in the programme:

    “…the research on false sexual abuse allegations made in custody cases shows that on average, they comprise around 10% of the total.”

    Which means that 90% of sexual abuse allegations have some basis in truth.
    This is supported by research evidence both in Australia and overseas.
    The psychiatrist talked inexplicably about ‘parentification’.

    Apparently it’s the new word.

    When asked specifically about parental alienation syndrome, which appears to be the basis of his work:

    “The concept of alienation, by which a parent consciously undermines the child’s relationship with the other parent, is still a valid concept.”

    ‘I refer to alienation if it specifically occurs and describe it but I avoid using the Parental Alienation Syndrome label, even though it is often useful, as it has now come under such scrutiny that it often creates more debate than is helpful.’

    Apparently you can follow the principles of parental alienation – just don’t call it that.

    Because Parental Alienation Syndrome has since been widely discredited, and is not recognised as having any scientific basis.
    Even Chief Justice of the Australian Family Court, Diana Bryant agrees:

    “there is no valid condition as Parental Alienation Syndrome.”

    But they still use it. And in priority over forensic child sexual abuse allegations conducted (when they are) over child protection authorities.
    I have written about these issues previously on this blog:
    The Fault that is Family Law – Part 2 Child Abuse and the Family Law System

    and about the problems with Parental Alienation and its cohorts:

    The Fault that is Family Law – Part 3

    The programme cited two cases where allegations of child sexual abuse were made against fathers during contact visits.
    In both cases reports from the expert witnesses determined the outcome for the children.

    In the first case, based on the expert’s report, the mother was advised by her lawyer that if she did not agree to unsupervised contact, she risked having the child removed from her care. The child visited her father regularly for the next 5 years where she was repeatedly and violently sexually abused. Due to the constraints of the court, neither her nor the child were able to raise child sexual abuse allegations.
    In the second case, in an ex-parte hearing, the judge and an appointed children’s lawyer met and made a judgement, based on the single expert report, that the children should be immediately removed from the mother’s care to go to live with the father.
    It is good that these issues are being raised in the media. However, women’s organisations in Australia (and overseas) have been raising these concerns for over 20 years.

     

    It is difficult to believe that there will ever be a time when the judicial system will provide protection of children from child sexual abuse, a time when children will be believed, a time when men’s rights to abuse and violate women and children will ever be stopped.

  • 09May

    stop intervention

    Racism and misogyny are at the heart of our two major parties.

     

    But what else would we expect from a white imperialist, capitalist, patriarchal system.

     
    Policies of both of the major parties over the past ten years have gone to new depths in their attacks on our First Nations peoples – their culture, their way of life and their very lives.

    And it is women and children who inevitably have suffered mostly as a result of these policies.

    The latest move is the threatened closure of remote Aboriginal communities.

    The threatened closure of Aboriginal communities comes as a result of the Federal Liberal coalition government cutting funding to Aboriginal communities and handing responsibility for these communities to State Governments.

    The Western Australian government has stated that it plans to close over 150 Aboriginal communities.
    PM Tony Abbott’s racism and disdain for our First Nation’s people is evident in his sneering comment in relation to the forced closure of communities.

    “It’s not the job of the taxpayers to subsidize lifestyle choices.”

    This is at a time when both Federal and State governments are rolling out the Welfare card.

     

    “Women and particularly indigenous women are the most impoverished in the world.”

    Eachone has written an excellent article about this: “Cashless Welfare to target Violence Against Women in Australia? Not in my name. Sexist, Racist and Unacceptable”

     

    On a recent Late Night Live panel heard Marcia Langton describe the situation for Indigenous women as a ‘national crisis’
    “Indigenous women are 34 times more likely to be hospitalised as a result of domestic violence than their non-Indigenous counterparts.”

    And some of the problems for Indigenous women include:
    – Reluctance to report
    – Mistrust between police and indigenous women
    – Racism within authorities

     

    The instigation of a welfare card practice leads to a greater exploitation and vulnerability for women and children.
    “Removing control of money from recipients is a dangerous practice. What the outraged or concerned media and general public call ‘paternalism’ is actually far worse. It is a means to ensure an expanding class of people vulnerable to exploitation. That the majority of the victims are women, indigenous and the young is not just an extreme act of ‘paternalism’, it is an extreme commitment to profit from the abuse of the bodies and lives of those most marginalized, by taking away what limited independence we may have.”Eachone

     

    In 2007, the federal government staged a massive intervention in the Northern Territory on the basis of the report, “Little Children are Sacred” as a result of a government inquiry into child sexual abuse in the Northern Territory.

     
    “The fall-out was a full-scale, (including army), intervention which resulted in the reinforcement of the unwavering, systemic stealing of children from their arms, to who knows where? The Department of Childrens Services have lost the files on some 8,000 children who are thus just “disappeared”.”

     
    The intervention in fact has done little to address child sexual abuse or violence against women.

     
    It is horrendous that our white male politicians use (abuse) the concept of protection women and children from violence and abuse for their own ends – mining of traditional lands is a suspect in this – whilst they go about destroying lives and communities.

    land grab

     

    “WA Premier Colin Barnett is using “child protection” as an excuse to forcibly remove entire communities from their lands, recycling the same lies about child abuse used to justify the NT Intervention. These forced closures will be systematic child abuse on a massive scale, putting families into destitution, more kids into foster care, more adults into prison.” Stop Stolen Generations

    These policies and actions have in fact had a devastating impact on our First Nations people, particularly women and children.

     
    And this is all being done under the well developed and over reported fabrication that our Indigenous peoples and communities are dysfunctional.

     
    The Eachone article highlights the racism and misogyny that these policies incur.

    The allegations of violence and abuse show no details of who and why such abuse occurs in Indigenous communities – and shows little information about how this compares to white Australia.
    Who is abusing young girls in these communities? Is it the same white men who commit violence and abuse in Australian society generally?

    “There was, and is, no acknowledgment of who does this to girls and women (men do this to them). There was no acknowledgment of more than 200 years of ongoing genocide in this country. Certainly, not a word about the prostituted as a class nor the acknowledgement of what the underlying structure of capitalism and male entitlement does to girls and women.”

    We know that young girls who are impoverished and vulnerable are more likely to be targets of abusive men – “the worst of those committing predatory behavior and violence.”

     
    Interestingly, two years after the Northern Territory Intervention, The Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs’ report Closing the Gap in the Northern Territory reveals that

    • convictions of child sexual abuse involving Aboriginal perpetrators have “barely changed”,

    Source:Creative Spirits

    This is a worldwide problem for Indigenous girls and women.
    And despite PM Rudd’s National apology to the Stolen Generation in 2008, children continue to be removed from Aboriginal families.

    “Since 1997 however, the number of Aboriginal children being forcibly removed has increased more than five times, with more than 15,000 Aboriginal kids in foster care today. In WA more than half of all children in ‘care’ are Aboriginal, despite being less than 5% of the population.” Grandmothers against Removals

    cropped-GmarMcGrady

     

     

     

     

     

    After 5 years of the intervention,Creative Spirits notes these astonishing statistics.

    The rate of suicide among Aboriginal girls has “greatly increased” since the intervention was launched. Girls accounted for 40% of all Aboriginal suicides of children under 17 years, a rate which is “the most in the Western world”. Prior to the intervention the suicide rate was “significantly lower” and in 1980 it was zero.

    There was a 69% increase of children getting taken into out of home care compared to 2007 figures.

    There has been a 40% increase in Aboriginal incarceration.

     

    Thousands of Australians marched in Australia last week against the forced closures of remote Aboriginal communities.

    stop closures                               stop closures1stop closure4
    It received little media attention – except in the Murdoch press where they were described as “a selfish rabble” – see report from Junkee 

     
    Since the British government invaded this land we have declared war on our First Nations People – and we are continuing to destroy their traditions, their cultures and their lives.

     
    This is not going to stop soon.

    We will need a revolution to stop this.

    And all Australians need to show our support for our First Nations people.

    Resources:

    SOSBlackAustralia/Grandmothers Against Removals: https://www.facebook.com/supportsosblakaustralia

    Stop Stolen Generations: https://stopstolengenerations.com.au/

    stop intervention

     

  • 04May

     

    This is an article written by Marcus Waters in The Conversation.

    I have quoted certain aspects of this article:

    “I have seen firsthand how child sexual abuse is rife in every part of the Australian community – but only sometimes is that abuse reported in full colour.”
    “The Royal Commission on institutionalised child sex abuse is shining a light on dark corners of systematic abuse of Australian kids over many generations. In the vast majority of the terrible cases we’ve heard about, the perpetrators and those who protected them have been seemingly upstanding, often senior, male community leaders.
    Old white men, in other words.”
    As human rights lawyer Anne Gallagher comments:
    “Cheap labour, cheap sex and cheap goods are woven into the fabric of our economy, our community and our individual lives within Australia.”
    “Stories like these are important. Yet too often, the fact that the abusers in these stories are not just western men, but white western men, goes unremarked.”
    “International research has shown that people who suffer the worst abuse are often in positions of helplessness or poverty.”
    “The reality is that the majority of my own Aboriginal people who have had to deal with abuse are struggling with these same issues of uncertainty, poverty and alienation that we know compound sexual violence and abuse.”
    “I can’t help but wonder: what would happen if white Australian children, women and men spoke up about the hidden abuse in their families, the way that Aboriginal people increasingly are doing?
    I honestly believe if this was to happen, the true statistics of those suffering would send shockwaves through this country.”

    Read the full article here

  • 28Apr

    ANROWS Public Lecture with Professor Liz Kelly CBE

    On Friday 13 February 2015 Professor Liz Kelly CBE delivered a lecture in Adelaide on re-visiting the continuum of sexual violence in the 21st century.

    I had the great privilege of attending this lecture by Liz Kelly earlier this year and I would highly recommend listening to this lecture.

     
    She talks of her early work and research “Surviving Sexual Violence” (I would recommend the book too.)

     

    surviving sexual violence

     
    I’m not going to pretend here that I can do any justice to her lecture or her work but wanted to highlight some of the important issues that she raised that struck me.

     
    One of the themes throughout her talk was women’s voices – the importance of listening to women’s experiences, women’s feelings and understanding women’s everyday experiences of violence.

     
    Liz Kelly’s work is conceptualising forms of violence as a continuum of violence against women. She explores the connections, for example, between sexual violence and domestic violence, asking questions about the categories we use; who decides what is abusive; what counts as abuse and the connections between them.

     
    She also referred to the work with Jill Radford “Nothing Really Happened” : the invalidation of women’s experiences of sexual violence  which analyses women’s experiences of sexual violence and how women name “unwanted sex”. They often didn’t want to name non-consensual or coercive sexual experiences as rape. There are no clear cut lines in women’s experiences.

    “Everyday routine intimate intrusions that were so central to the idea of a continuum.”

    Whilst women claim ‘nothing really happened’ they were intimidated, they were made to feel fearful. Liz Kelly describes this as a form of terror, in which the intention is to intimidate, to make women feel afraid, telling women that they “don’t have the same right to be in this space.”

     
    And women learn to adapt – to the potential of male violence. This is the reality of women’s lives.

     
    Liz cited Swedish law in which the underlying principle is that sexual violence is a violation of women’s integrity. It is therefore not located as force.

     
    What Liz highlights is that many women’s experiences of violence are ‘everyday’, are perceived by society as ‘mundane encounters’ and yet they are the “fabric of women’s everyday lives”.

     
    Which means that when we attempt to tally up the extent of violence against women we are not counting all violence against women. Our criminal system records violence in incidents rather than the “pattern of coercive control” which Evan Stark has examined.
    There are wider concepts of harm which we need to look at from a human rights perspective.

    Liz Kelly clearly highlights that male violence against women erodes women’s agency and fundamental freedoms – it constrains every woman’s agency.

    This clip does not include question time but her response to one question was awesome:

    “What we need is a feminist revolution”

  • 09Apr

     

    Well what a night of television.
    It started with the news (ABC SA). Their 3 leading news items were as follows:

     

    1. The finding of the Coroner’s report into the death of Chloe Valentine – a four year old girl whose mother and her partner were found guilty of criminal neglect and manslaughter. The report was scathing of SA’s child protection system and has called for a massive overhaul.

     
    2. The drowning of 3 Sudanese children (another child is in a serious condition) in Melbourne in a car driven by the mother which ended up in a lake. The mother is now helping the police with their inquiries.

     
    3. 250 Australian men convicted of child sex offenses traveled to the Philippines last year.

    “It comes as Filipino police continue to build a case against an Australian man, Peter Gerard Scully, who is accused of some of the worst child sex offenses in the nation’s history.”

    He is also being charged with the death of at least one child. It is understood that he was producing child pornography for sale.

     
    Then I watched Redfern Now. It was about 2 Indigenous women raped by a white middle class man. They chose different paths – one not wanting to report it to the police, fearing the shame and humiliation; the other reporting him and taking him to Court and grilled because of being a single mother, Centrelink fraud and working for cash. In a positive turn of events the man is found guilty – not a common occurrence in rape cases.

     

    redfernnow

    Deborah Mailman as Lorraine, Anthony Hayes as Daryl and Rarriwuy Hick as Robyn in Redfern Now: The Telemovie.

    Why do all of these make me angry; make me want to cry with rage and sorrow?

    We know the Child Protection system sucks. It lacks resources, funding and properly trained and experienced staff. It largely targets women – whether they are victims of male violence; living in poverty with poor resources to raise their children. And we also know that the child protection system takes a punitive approach to women, regardless of their circumstances – because well women are always to blame.
    At the same time that the SA government says it will respond to this report, funding is being cut from so many services that could help mothers, particularly single mothers.
    And yet one of the key recommendations of the Coroner’s report:

    “The State Government begin negotiations with the Commonwealth to make a child protection income management regime permanent.”

    A measure that will leave women with fewer resources, tells them they are inferior and incapable of looking after themselves, aimed at working class mothers – and assumes that child abuse is a class issue – that it is only the poor who neglect and abuse their children.
    And it is important to say – there is a difference between neglect (which often is a result of poverty) and child abuse – so often about male violence against women and children – in all classes.

     

     

    And when we turn to the tragedy of the Sudanese children – what resources do we provide to those from war-torn countries who come to Australia seeking shelter and a better way of life? How much trauma counselling is available; how much support are they given in adapting to a strange and alien environment? And importantly how do the media portray our immigrants and refugees from non-Western countries? How much racism are they subjected to?

     
    It is astounding that the Federal Government can make it illegal for Australians to travel to Syria – out of our fear of “home-grown terrorists” – and we have no laws that prevent convicted child sexual abusers from traveling to South East Asia where extreme poverty puts children at risk of rape and murder – by Australian men.

     

    In all of these cases it is really quite simply the paternalistic, imperialist, patriarchal culture which creates these situations – and provides no avenues to challenge this ideology.

    I doubt that any proposed changes to the Child Protection system will really make children safer. It is far more likely to become more punitive to women in vulnerable situations.
    Our current ethos is racist.

    If this Sudanese mother is found responsible for the deaths of her children it surely must speak to our failure.

     

    And why is it not a national emergency that Australian child sexual offenders are granted the freedom to travel oversees to sexually abuse children?

     

    And women continue to be raped – and when they are Indigenous women – they have very little hope of the judicial system providing justice.

    But we are so grateful to Deborah Mailman (and the writers) for her portrayal of a strong Indigenous woman who takes the system on and wins!

  • 06Jan

     

    “How Certain Efforts To Prevent Human Trafficking Are Proving To Be Hurtful”

    This is an interesting article from Holly Smith.

     

    trafficked woman
    She expresses concerns about the use of extreme examples of the harms done to women and girls through child sex trafficking – the images of bound, gagged and tortured girls to raise awareness about sex trafficking.

    “As I continued to speak, I began to notice posters displayed at many of these awareness events. They often portrayed girls who were beaten, drugged or tied to beds, or something similar to indicate circumstances of force and bondage.
    None of these images represented my experience. I wasn’t abducted from my bedroom; I wasn’t held in shackles, and I was never in fear for my life. I began to question whether or not I was a victim of sex trafficking.
    And, then, I stopped sharing my story.”

    She describes her own story of being lured, not forced or coerced into prostitution.

    Her experience when telling her story was that people began to question why she did not leave if she was not being physically forced to stay in prostitution – why she chose to continue as a “willing victim”. She argues that this can make girls and women feel that they were somehow to blame for their victimisation.

    “I again felt like that 14-year-old girl who had been misunderstood, judged and blamed by law enforcement, family members and friends.”

    This resonated for me in our advocacy work around other forms of male violence against women and children, such as domestic violence.

     

    When we raise awareness of male violence against women we use images which we hope will shock and make people sit up and take notice.

    Pictures of bruises and injuries; statistics about deaths and injuries are powerful ways of creating the attention that is needed.
    These images fail to take into account those women who do not necessarily experience physical violence – or where physical violence is only the tip of the iceberg of abuse. They also do not reflect the complexity of male violence against women and children – the grooming, the establishment of dependency and forced isolation, the coercive control that men place on women.
    Neither does it recognize other abusive behaviours such as financial abuse, emotional abuse and the many other forms of male abuse that men use to dominate and control women.
    When we create in the minds of the public this image of battered women are we doing a disservice to other forms of abusive behaviour that women experience?
    We hold women responsible for many things, including their own victimization. If there are no bruises, no injuries are we setting up women to be blamed for not leaving, for not escaping from abusive relationships, as Holly began to experience in telling her story?

    “They can unintentionally cause the public to project blame onto those whose backgrounds and spirits are so broken that they fail to see a life in prostitution as something from which they need to be “rescued.””

    “We must never interrogate a child victim about his or her actions, or lack of actions. We must, instead, question which factors would drive a child to become a “willing victim,” and we must hold the perpetrator(s) accountable, not the child.”

    This holds equally for women trapped in abusive relationships.
    Holly Smith is the author of “Walking Prey: How America’s Youth are Vulnerable to Sex Slavery.”

    walking prey
    “Holly is a survivor of child sex trafficking and an advocate against all forms of human trafficking and child exploitation. She works with survivors of abuse, anti-trafficking organizations, and pro-empowerment programs across the globe.”