On Lip this week: The tampon tax: where are we now Diversity on television Feminists on film: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon GPS trackers being considered for domestic violence offenders Elsewhere on the Interwebs: First ever TED talk on abortion Ana Tijoux, a Chilean rapper, releases ‘Antipatriarca’ music video (and it’s pretty catchy) A Californian teen…
Read more
Joan Kirner, Victoria’s first and only female premier, passed away yesterday after a two year battle with oesophageal cancer. The seventy-six year old devoted much of her life to fighting for gender equality, and was one of the dominant influences in the political life of Australia’s first female PM, Julia Gillard. Ms Kirner hadn’t always been…
Read more
Tampon tax protest outside Parliament House On Thursday, approximately 50 people (including five dressed as tampons) gathered on the lawns outside Parliament House to lobby against the tampon tax. National debate about the tampon tax was reignited last Monday after campaigner Subeta Vimalarajah confronted Joe Hockey on Q&A, resulting in Mr Hockey pledging to push…
Read more
It is often said that we ask far fewer questions about the world as we get older; that we settle into complacency and begin to feel less curious about this big, wondrous universe of ours. And in some ways, that’s true. I personally no longer throw a barrage of questions to those around me about…
Read more
A few months ago I decided to go sans makeup for a month in order to write an article about the experience. I had the entire piece written in my head, even before that first day of heading to work with my au naturel face on display for the world to see. In this article,…
Read more
*Trigger warning: descriptions of female genital mutilation* On Saturday 11 October I went to TEDx Canberra, a conference, like all TED conferences, dedicated to the sharing of ideas. I was particularly impressed that just over half of the presenters at TEDx Canberra this year were women. What I found most impressive about it was the…
Read more
Unless you have avoided all forms of media over the last few weeks, then you have most likely heard about Baby Gammy. But on the off chance that you don’t have a clue what I’m talking about, a Western Australia couple paid for a surrogate in Thailand and she gave birth to twins, one of…
Read more
I don’t know if J K Rowling is really insecure about her work even after all of the success, or just bored and missing good old HP in the spotlight, but for some reason she has decided to backtrack on one of the storylines from the Harry Potter series: namely, who the heroine, Hermione, ended…
Read more
Publisher of Mamamia, Mia Freedman, posed the following question in an article on January 13: Are selfies vain? To which she a responded with an enthusiastic ‘hell yeah they are!’ – with many of the commenters on her article in full agreement with this sentiment. The Oxford Dictionary defines vain as ‘having or showing an…
Read more
Last week the story broke that a man had set up a female online dating profile, to see if women really did have it easier than men when hunting for love in cyberspace. His story described how he took the profile down in two hours, stating: ‘I figured I would get some weird messages here and…
Read more
I first became aware of the pervasive sexism when it comes to women’s sports teams in my first year of university. It was around the time that I discovered the Canberra Capitals and turned into an avid women’s basketball fan. Whenever I told anyone about my fondness for the team, they would snigger and say…
Read more
DC Comics just can’t seem to get enough negative press at the moment. First they make a decision not to allow Batwoman to marry her female partner, and then they announce their new competition. Not just any competition, mind you, but a competition to draw four panels featuring popular villain Harley Quinn preparing to commit…
Read more
On the 2nd of this month, Neil Mitchell took to Twitter to share this gem: ‘about to do the chat room on Nine. Any views on women who cry at work? Weakness or tactic?’ This upset quite a few people, for good reason. After all, weakness and tactic are both very negative words with a…
Read more
‘India: The Story You Never Wanted to Hear’ was posted by Michaela Cross (using the username RoseChasm) on CNN iReport, and describes the sexual harassment she experienced when studying abroad in India. Since it was first posted on the website (on the 18th of this month) it has received over a million page views and…
Read more
