Thousands of women have banded together to post selfies to debunk the myth women who wear makeup are ashamed of their everyday appearance. Posting images of themselves with half their face made up and the other portion bare, the hashtag ‘PowerOfMakeup’ has demonstrated defiance towards those alleging they are victims chained to the beauty industry….
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A seventh generation White Witch, Sarah Kulkens uses timeless rituals and spells to help people. This eccentric religion which was once thought of as evil and satanic proves to be quite opposite to its stereotypes. Unfortunately, Sarah is still being bombarded with hate mail for practising witchcraft. Hailing from a long line of witches since…
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A two-year study of modern day hunter-gatherer societies has dismissed the idea that sexual equality is a new invention, or that it emerged with modernity, instead suggesting that egalitarianism was a norm for early civilisations. The anthropologists leading the discovery have also proposed that these early values are the indirect cause for human cooperation and…
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Destroy The Joint’s (DTJ) Counting Dead Women campaign was launched on 20 May 2014 to honour women who have lost their lives as a result of violence. Inspired by a model developed by a UK Counting Dead Women Register, the count includes all violent acts, such as murders traditionally attributed as Domestic Violence (‘DV’,…
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The ‘joys’ of motherhood are undoubtedly lost on me. The inverted commas that I have deliberately and strategically placed around ‘joys’ say it all. Mind you, I have never experienced being a mother for myself, so of course I wouldn’t know. But I have my conspiracy theories. I have heard too many horror stories…
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I’m not a mother so I’ve never been celebrated on Mother’s Day. I did, however, celebrate 27 Mother’s Days with my mum, until she died in 2006 from breast cancer. I think about my mum every day. Her absence from my life weighs heavily. My relationship to my grief changes over time but I…
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It is a murky practice that is rarely discussed within its own culture, let alone outside it. Khadija Gbla is a nationally recognised spokesperson and survivor of Female Genital Mutilation. ‘I didn’t even know what Female Genital Mutilation was growing up, I never heard of it being spoken of,’ Khadija says. Khadija, aged 27, was…
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For most of my childhood I remained blissfully oblivious to any notion of beauty standards. In primary school, I was always the ‘tomboy’ – someone who shunned the school dress for pants and a long sleeved polo and who spent lunchtimes playing rugby and soccer. Yet this wasn’t just a phase that characterised my pre-adolescent…
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In my experiences of working in retail, I’ve been pretty fortunate in regards to sexism. Apart from a few stand-out occurrences, most of my working retail life has been sexism-free, at least on the surface. However, the few times when I have been made to feel uncomfortable – because I happen to identify as female…
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It doesn’t feel like all too long ago that I was sitting drafting the first of my Lip articles about travelling Australia on my own. When my travels were stretched out in front of me, it felt like forever, but now that it’s almost over it seems my endless days are numbered. I can now…
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**TW: rape, violence** It’s been one year, one month and ten days. One year, one month and ten days later and I am not afraid of going to sleep anymore. Like a child, I was afraid of the dark. It’s fair to say that I haven’t really known myself in this time. I have been…
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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,…
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In celebration of Father’s Day, Holly Lazzari shares a story about her dad and reminds us to appreciate the people we have in our lives. I’ll admit it; I’m a complete Daddy’s girl. My dad and I find the same things funny, we always have stuff to chat about, we have loads in common, and a…
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I’m late, I’m late. I’m sorry I missed the deadline last week. Much has been afoot here in the Berra for this columnist and I’ve consequently been quite exhausted. Rest assured, however, that my commitment to providing you with the best in mediocre love advice has not waned. So, to the point. I saw the…
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