Gillard: Love Is All You Need This week on ABC programme, Q&A, Julia Gillard appeared alone and answered audience questions. One question came from a war veteran who asked her why his son couldn’t get married. Her response: ‘I think that you can have a relationship of love and commitment and trust and understanding…
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Same-Sex Marriage Supported by Celebrities If the democratic system won’t bring equality, celebrity endorsements might get you there. This week, Marie Claire magazine (owned by the same company that brought you Channel Seven) in partnership with GetUp officially announced its support for marriage equality in Australia. The magazine launched the ‘I do’ campaign, showcasing…
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Support For Same-Sex Marriage Passes in NSW Senate After much discussion, the New South Wales Upper House has voted in support of same-sex marriage. There was applause as the motion passed on Thursday afternoon, 22 votes to 16. The motion is to essentially work to encourage the federal government to legalise same-sex marriage. Both ALP…
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Hustler magazine photoshops penis into commentator’s mouth “What would S.E Cupp look like with a [d**k] in her mouth?” This is the question posed by Hustler magazine in a recently published edition that features a photo of the conservative right-wing commentator with a Photoshopped penis in her mouth. The blurb alongside the image reads: ‘S.E….
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mali: women’s rights set back 50 years Mali is a strongly patriarchal society where women need to ask permission from their husbands just to leave the house. Feminist groups have been campaigning to change the laws of Mali to enable women to get basic rights and make educating all girls an attainable goal. The…
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Man jailed for Nude Facebook Photos In a landmark case a man has been sentenced to jail for posting nude pictures of his ex-girlfriend on Facebook. This is the first time in Australia that someone has been convicted of a crime committed on social media and one of only a few cases of this kind…
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controvery surrounds new nasogastric tube diet They say a woman is never as slim as she was on her wedding day, and if there’s any truth to that little titbit, we think we’ve discovered the reason. Move over, Atkins, there’s a new fad diet in town! No soups, no pills, no foul-smelling imported teas; all…
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Call for Nike Boycott Last week, in a Cambodian factory which manufactures Nike apparel, at least 107 female garment workers fainted. It is believed that poor ventilation and the use of harsh chemicals caused this mass fainting. Fainting is not uncommon in the course of factory operations. It is believed that exposure to factory conditions…
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Stalker App Pulled Blogger John Brownlee posted an article a few weeks ago warning women of the potential dangers of technology and stalking. An app called ‘Girls Around Me’ uses publically available facebook and foursquare information in order to show the users who is geographically close to them. To make it even more scary, the…
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Israel’s New Photoshop Law Legislation has been passed in Israel which bans underweight models and requires advertisers to disclose where they have used Photoshop to alter images to make a model appear thinner than they are in every instance. The legislation is an effort to change idealised perceptions of beauty that, according to evidence presented…
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This Week in Marriage Equality It has been a big week for marriage equality. The biggest story was probably Bob Katter’s Australia Party’s crazy video which ‘accuses’ wannabe Queensland Premier, Campbell Newman of supporting gay marriage (Lord forbid). The video is so offensive that even Andrew Bolt doesn’t like it! Earlier this week, first submissions…
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A Right to Kill Newborns? Late last week, Australian philosophers Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva argued in the British Medical Journal that killing a newborn is of no moral difference to aborting a foetus. This is justified on the basis that a newborn and a foetus have the same lack of a sense of their own life and aspiration. As long…
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Even More Defence Force Sexism The Australian Defence Force has seemed to appear in this column more weeks than not. Yet another disappointing example of the sexism rife in the Defence Force was brought to light this week. In this case, the ABC has been given access to a private facebook group of over 1000 former and serving members…
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First Female PM Under Threat You obviously would have heard of recent news of the upcoming leadership battle in the Australian Labour party between current Prime Minister Julia Gillard and (now) former Foreign Affairs Minister Kevin Rudd. Will Australia continue to have a female head of state? We’ll know on Monday. Regardless of what you…
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