So I guess I'm supposed to think it's like real nice that the big, strong mainstream media (The Toronto Star) sat up and paid attention to The Miss G__ Project's action yesterday (seeing how they seem to have missed entirely the hugely important nation-wide 3rd Annual Rally for Our Missing Sisters).
But I'm actually feeling like it's not that nice at all.
The article in the Star, written by someone who's covered the project twice before, is peppered with inaccuracies and leaves out a major part of the campaign; that is, the huge public mobilization that took place across the province.
Here is a letter Sarah G, co-founder of the project, just wrote in response
To the Editor:
We would like to thank the Star for covering yesterday's actions by The Miss G__ Project for Equity in Education and our supporters to demand the approval of a Women's and Gender Studies course in the Ontario high school curriculum. I would, however, like to make a few clarifications and expand on some important points.
First, the major 'turn out' yesterday was not the 15 or so people standing in front of the Ministry of Education, but rather the HUNDREDS of individuals who called the Ministry expressing their support for our cause, not to mention the many who also sent emails, letters, and Miss G_ postcards as part of our "No More Miss Nice G_!" campaign. (We had sent you a press release explaining this campaign on Wednesday.) Phone-in days were (and will be) held in campuses across the province, and many high school students phoned-in voicing their support -- including an entire class in Kirkland Lakes. We hope that the Star will also acknowledge the incredible mass effort put forward by the people of Ontario yesterday to demand that this course be added to the curriculum.
I would also like to clarify that the government is not funding pilot courses. Rather, those courses which have been taught over the past few years were designed by individual teachers and approved by their school boards. These dedicated teachers put in their own time and finances to create these courses for their students, and they have received no compensation. We hope, as well, that the Star will recognize the commitment of these teachers to bringing feminist curricula and women's history into their schools, where there was none before.
Finally, regarding our ourdoor demonstration: the 'wall' we created included a harrowing number of articles related to young Ontarians and issues of safety within high schools, including experiences of boys who have been assaulted and harassed. A Women's and Gender Studies class would be a safe and inclusive academic setting in which students could talk openly and critically about these issues and how they affect their lives and futures. As students we work with have told us, the opportunity to take a high school-level WGS course has been life-changing and eye-opening, and has empowered them to challenge injustices, such as the rampant sexual assault and harassment that goes on in their schools. By changing the curriculum, we are demanding not only a change of lesson-plans and textbooks; we are asking that the government meet its own policy objectives to create safe and inclusive learning environments in which all students can have equal access to opportunities and information. Students armed with these conceptual tools make more informed and responsible citizens, no matter what path they take in life after graduation.
We were disappointed, as well, not to see any coverage of the March for Missing Aboriginal Sisters which took place at Yonge and College. We will look forward to seeing our clarifications in print, and thank you again for your coverage or these important events.
And here's one from soapboxspinster blogger movingtargets :
To the editor,
Thank you for your coverage of yesterday's Miss G__ Project Valentine's Day campaign, but I think it's necessary to correct a few errors that appeared in your publication.
Most importantly, Ms. Brown's article stated that the government has provided some funding for pilot Women's & Gender courses in a handful of Ontario schools. This is not true. While there are a number of courses being taught in Ontario today, the government has not given a cent. These courses are developed out of pocked by innovative teachers who receive no compensation.
These pilot courses should be not be read as the Ontario government's response to violence and harassment in schools, but rather as result of the hard work of activists and progressive teachers and students who are working at making change despite the Ministry's continued inaction.
Additionally, your article fails to mention that the main thrust of this campaign was a email-writing, valentine-sending & phone-in campaign in which we estimate close to 500 people contacted the Ministry yesterday alone in support of getting Women's & Gender studies into the curriculum as a way to make our schools safer and more equitable spaces for all students.
While the demonstration at Mowat Block was a great success, the greater success was the active public mobilization around this issue that your article ignored.
I just wish that the good folk who are part of the big machine that is news media would pay close attention to things like press releases, or really listen to what people are saying when they're being interviewed. I feel like we're supposed to be so unequivocally grateful that we're even being covered by Him, that we're not expected to care about how we're taken up/represented by the (Media) Man. And I'm over that. The coverage was lame and didn't even represent the actual campaign, let alone its spirit, what it was informed by, what its outcomes were, and so on. It missed the point entirely... even when it was handed The Point(s) in press releases, youtube videos, facebook groups, interviews, follow-up to interviews, and so on.
Like don't deign to cover our campaign, if you're simply going to cover up the reality of it.
Friday, February 15, 2008
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
No More Miss Nice G!
What's a major campaign without a snappy and exciting PROMOTIONAL VIDEO to get you in the mood? Produced by our very own jennaow, youtuber to the stars:
Sure to be the brightest 4.5 minutes of your day, this vid includes:
- glamour
- suspense
- helpful step-by-step guidelines on how to call the Ministry
- some things you could say, and expect to hear, when you call
Get more info on the Miss G Website!!
www.themissgproject.org
Sure to be the brightest 4.5 minutes of your day, this vid includes:
- glamour
- suspense
- helpful step-by-step guidelines on how to call the Ministry
- some things you could say, and expect to hear, when you call
Get more info on the Miss G Website!!
www.themissgproject.org
Saturday, February 9, 2008
What's missing in Ontario's high schools
Why doesn't our school system think highly enough of education to use it as a tool to prevent violence and harassment?
Imagine an average Ontario high school classroom of around 30 students.
If it is indeed an ‘average’ class, eight of the girls and four of the boys sitting in those rows of desks have been victims of verbal forms sexual harassment at school.
Five of those girls and two or three of the boys have been touched or grabbed in an unwanted sexual way – again, while at school.
And if it’s an older class, at least eight of the girls and around three of the boys have been pressured into doing something sexual they didn’t want to do.
OK, so imagining, let alone finding an “average” high school classroom in Ontario would be impossible, but that doesn’t make these numbers any less real or alarming.
These are the statistics that came out of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health’s recent study on sexual harassment and related behaviours among youth, released this week. The study surveyed more than 1,800 grade 9 and 11 students in 23 Ontario schools.
The CAMH study confirms and emphasizes the findings of the School Community Safety Panel’s 1,000+ page report on safety in Toronto public schools (a.k.a. the Falconer Report, named for the panel’s chair Julian Falconer), released just a few days before.
The Falconer Report found that in Toronto, sexual assaults and sexual harassment are happening in schools at a startling rate, that girls are much more likely to experience it than boys, and, moreover, that most cases are going unreported.
Both studies also show that experience of sexual harassment in schools is closely related to very serious long-term effects in students, including depression, low self esteem, missed school days, declining grades, and substance abuse.
In short, gender-based forms of violence and harassment in high schools are a bigger problem than perhaps anyone realized.
Well, except of course for teachers and school administrators.
Oh, and anyone who’s attended high school.
Actually, the truth is, alarming as these numbers are, they’re not new. A 1995 study, nearly 15 years ago now, by the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation found that over 80% of female students had been sexually harassed at school.
Not to mention the stacks and stacks of feminist (and other progressive) education scholarship that’s been done since the 1970s looking at the ways in which equity and safety intersect to make high school environments what they are for certain populations.
How long can we wait before implementing measures to ensure that the most vulnerable students are not being robbed of their right to go to school in a safe and secure environment, as is supposedly guaranteed by the Ontario government?
This action will require not merely responding to these disturbing “new” statistics in the Falconer and CAMH reports, but rather looking to the root causes that are occasioning such a high level of harassment and violence in high schools.
So why is this happening in Ontario schools?
Sure, high schools are sexually charged places. High school hallways are certainly minefields of raging hormones, confusing questions about sexuality and identity, and complex social hierarchies that thousands of teenagers must negotiate together as they all rush head-on through puberty, adolescence and young adulthood.
But that can’t be all, because assault and harassment are certainly not a necessary consequence of adolescent sexuality. Moreover, anti-bullying and anti-violence measures currently in use by school boards clearly aren’t proving effective.
The Falconer Report argues that these programs are ineffective because they take a gender neutral stance and don’t address very real forms of inequity that affect students' lives and, the Report argues, lie at the root of much of the violence and harassment occurring in schools.
In other words, our school system is vastly underestimating the way that social inequities (and not just those of sex and gender, but also race and class) powerfully condition how safe or unsafe our schools are.
Sexism, racism, poverty, and other forms of inequity are a fact of life for many high school students in varying ways and degrees – just as they are for the world outside of the high school walls. But what our school system is lacking, these new reports (and their predecessors) tell us, are the tools and information to help students successfully confront and negotiate these very real inequities.
Isn`t providing students with the tools with which to confront and negotiate their lives what education is (or is supposed to be) all about? We must ask why then, are these urgent issues not being addressed in the classroom?
It is becoming increasingly clear that what our schools are shying away from (at their own peril) is engaging students in critical discussions on gender, equality, sexism, gender roles, homophobia, race, and class – and how these and other forms of discrimination and oppression all intersect in complicated ways. These are issues that are virtually nonexistent in the current standard curriculum, but that are clearly nonetheless powerfully at work throughout the school system.
Students also need much more adequate information on healthy relationships, sex, sexuality, body image, harassment, assault, and violence that goes far beyond a few pamphlets in the guidance office and two or three days work in (often, optional) health classes.
We also need to be engaging boys in discussions about masculinity, gender roles and homophobia, as these most recent reports identified all of these things as contributing to male students becoming perpetrators of violence
Moreover, we need course content that allows students to see themselves in their education, as studies continuously show students always do better in school and develop stronger self-esteem and sense of self when this is so. This would mean a shift towards (for example) more girl-centric and afro-centric curricula – more women authors in English class, more non-white faces in our history books (etc.).
We also need more training for teachers, not only so that they can effectively handle issues of gender based violence and diffuse charged situations before they turn potentially dangerous, but also so that they can engage students in meaningful discussions about the societal causes and effects of gender based violence.
Most of all, what our schools are lacking are holistic, school-wide approaches that focus on the root causes of violence and harassment as a means to prevention, not simply reaction. This is not simply a question of equity or `fairness` in schools; we`re seeing daily that it`s an incredibly urgent question of safety and of the basic human right to an education.
For the last three years, the Miss G__ Project for Equity in Education has been lobbying the Ministry of Education to implement a Women`s and Gender Studies course into the Ontario High School Curriculum.
Following WGS scholarship in post-secondary education, The Miss G__ Project envisions WGS as a high school course, directed at both female and male students, which would address all these needs laid out by the CAMH and Falconer Reports by providing students with the tools, education and language necessary to confront sexism, racism and classism in their daily lives.
Several visionary high school teachers are already teaching locally developed WGS courses across the province because they know first hand the urgency and simply couldn`t wait any longer for the Ministry to act.
In response to the Falconer Report, Minister of Education Kathleen Wynne told the Toronto Star that she is "very supportive of preventative measures." The CAMH and Falconer Reports, not to mention the news reports of gender based violence in schools we hear so regularly, confirm that giving students the tools they desperately need as part of the education they deserve to receive in a safe environment is a preventative measure this province cannot afford to wait on any longer.
On February 14, the Miss G__ Project is conducting a phone calling campaign encouraging supporters to call the Minister of Education expressing the urgency and demand for WGS material to be implemented into the curriculum sooner rather than later as an effective means of preventing harassment and violence in our schools.
For more information, please visit the Project`s website at www.themissgproject.org or email themissgproject@gmail.com.
(If you're on facebook, you can check out Miss G's campaign page here: http://facebook.com/event.php?eid=8006913425
Imagine an average Ontario high school classroom of around 30 students.
If it is indeed an ‘average’ class, eight of the girls and four of the boys sitting in those rows of desks have been victims of verbal forms sexual harassment at school.
Five of those girls and two or three of the boys have been touched or grabbed in an unwanted sexual way – again, while at school.
And if it’s an older class, at least eight of the girls and around three of the boys have been pressured into doing something sexual they didn’t want to do.
OK, so imagining, let alone finding an “average” high school classroom in Ontario would be impossible, but that doesn’t make these numbers any less real or alarming.
These are the statistics that came out of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health’s recent study on sexual harassment and related behaviours among youth, released this week. The study surveyed more than 1,800 grade 9 and 11 students in 23 Ontario schools.
The CAMH study confirms and emphasizes the findings of the School Community Safety Panel’s 1,000+ page report on safety in Toronto public schools (a.k.a. the Falconer Report, named for the panel’s chair Julian Falconer), released just a few days before.
The Falconer Report found that in Toronto, sexual assaults and sexual harassment are happening in schools at a startling rate, that girls are much more likely to experience it than boys, and, moreover, that most cases are going unreported.
Both studies also show that experience of sexual harassment in schools is closely related to very serious long-term effects in students, including depression, low self esteem, missed school days, declining grades, and substance abuse.
In short, gender-based forms of violence and harassment in high schools are a bigger problem than perhaps anyone realized.
Well, except of course for teachers and school administrators.
Oh, and anyone who’s attended high school.
Actually, the truth is, alarming as these numbers are, they’re not new. A 1995 study, nearly 15 years ago now, by the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation found that over 80% of female students had been sexually harassed at school.
Not to mention the stacks and stacks of feminist (and other progressive) education scholarship that’s been done since the 1970s looking at the ways in which equity and safety intersect to make high school environments what they are for certain populations.
How long can we wait before implementing measures to ensure that the most vulnerable students are not being robbed of their right to go to school in a safe and secure environment, as is supposedly guaranteed by the Ontario government?
This action will require not merely responding to these disturbing “new” statistics in the Falconer and CAMH reports, but rather looking to the root causes that are occasioning such a high level of harassment and violence in high schools.
So why is this happening in Ontario schools?
Sure, high schools are sexually charged places. High school hallways are certainly minefields of raging hormones, confusing questions about sexuality and identity, and complex social hierarchies that thousands of teenagers must negotiate together as they all rush head-on through puberty, adolescence and young adulthood.
But that can’t be all, because assault and harassment are certainly not a necessary consequence of adolescent sexuality. Moreover, anti-bullying and anti-violence measures currently in use by school boards clearly aren’t proving effective.
The Falconer Report argues that these programs are ineffective because they take a gender neutral stance and don’t address very real forms of inequity that affect students' lives and, the Report argues, lie at the root of much of the violence and harassment occurring in schools.
In other words, our school system is vastly underestimating the way that social inequities (and not just those of sex and gender, but also race and class) powerfully condition how safe or unsafe our schools are.
Sexism, racism, poverty, and other forms of inequity are a fact of life for many high school students in varying ways and degrees – just as they are for the world outside of the high school walls. But what our school system is lacking, these new reports (and their predecessors) tell us, are the tools and information to help students successfully confront and negotiate these very real inequities.
Isn`t providing students with the tools with which to confront and negotiate their lives what education is (or is supposed to be) all about? We must ask why then, are these urgent issues not being addressed in the classroom?
It is becoming increasingly clear that what our schools are shying away from (at their own peril) is engaging students in critical discussions on gender, equality, sexism, gender roles, homophobia, race, and class – and how these and other forms of discrimination and oppression all intersect in complicated ways. These are issues that are virtually nonexistent in the current standard curriculum, but that are clearly nonetheless powerfully at work throughout the school system.
Students also need much more adequate information on healthy relationships, sex, sexuality, body image, harassment, assault, and violence that goes far beyond a few pamphlets in the guidance office and two or three days work in (often, optional) health classes.
We also need to be engaging boys in discussions about masculinity, gender roles and homophobia, as these most recent reports identified all of these things as contributing to male students becoming perpetrators of violence
Moreover, we need course content that allows students to see themselves in their education, as studies continuously show students always do better in school and develop stronger self-esteem and sense of self when this is so. This would mean a shift towards (for example) more girl-centric and afro-centric curricula – more women authors in English class, more non-white faces in our history books (etc.).
We also need more training for teachers, not only so that they can effectively handle issues of gender based violence and diffuse charged situations before they turn potentially dangerous, but also so that they can engage students in meaningful discussions about the societal causes and effects of gender based violence.
Most of all, what our schools are lacking are holistic, school-wide approaches that focus on the root causes of violence and harassment as a means to prevention, not simply reaction. This is not simply a question of equity or `fairness` in schools; we`re seeing daily that it`s an incredibly urgent question of safety and of the basic human right to an education.
For the last three years, the Miss G__ Project for Equity in Education has been lobbying the Ministry of Education to implement a Women`s and Gender Studies course into the Ontario High School Curriculum.
Following WGS scholarship in post-secondary education, The Miss G__ Project envisions WGS as a high school course, directed at both female and male students, which would address all these needs laid out by the CAMH and Falconer Reports by providing students with the tools, education and language necessary to confront sexism, racism and classism in their daily lives.
Several visionary high school teachers are already teaching locally developed WGS courses across the province because they know first hand the urgency and simply couldn`t wait any longer for the Ministry to act.
In response to the Falconer Report, Minister of Education Kathleen Wynne told the Toronto Star that she is "very supportive of preventative measures." The CAMH and Falconer Reports, not to mention the news reports of gender based violence in schools we hear so regularly, confirm that giving students the tools they desperately need as part of the education they deserve to receive in a safe environment is a preventative measure this province cannot afford to wait on any longer.
On February 14, the Miss G__ Project is conducting a phone calling campaign encouraging supporters to call the Minister of Education expressing the urgency and demand for WGS material to be implemented into the curriculum sooner rather than later as an effective means of preventing harassment and violence in our schools.
For more information, please visit the Project`s website at www.themissgproject.org or email themissgproject@gmail.com.
(If you're on facebook, you can check out Miss G's campaign page here: http://facebook.com/event.php?eid=8006913425
Thursday, May 24, 2007
the glorious dr. ursula franklin...
the other night i had the privilege of attending an event hosted by the feminist legal analysis section (FLAC) of the ontario bar association (OBA), where the glorious dr ursula franklin (a self-described "unrepentant feminist and an unrepentant pacifist") was awarded FLAC's "commitment to equality" award. dinner was fabulous (we were sitting with some really wonderful women), and got even better when dr franklin spoke and engaged in a conversation with us on "feminism in the here and now"
a little bit more on dr franklin:
Join us in celebrating Dr. Ursula Franklin, the brilliant and visionary scientist and humanitarian, and social justice and peace advocate, whose feminism is an essential part of her life. A mentor and role model to generations of women in science, an activist Quaker and pacifist, her most recent book, The Ursula Franklin Reader: Pacifism as a Map (2006), will be a feminist classic.
Dr. Franklin is an inspiration to women and truly an example of someone who is not afraid to act on her convictions, and who helps to make this world a better place to live. She is University Professor Emerita at the University of Toronto and a Companion of the Order of Canada.
and more: wikipedia entry on dr. franklin
some really interesting ideas/anecdotes/thoughts were shared by dr franklin, who is truly a pleasure to listen to. here are some points i've managed to pull out from my pages of excited scribbles:
- dr franklin spoke of seeing feminism as a social ordering vastly different from patriarchy, and that it is not just an employment agency for women
- she pointed to the existence of "lady patriarchs" -- women who choose power over true feminist action and change [when she was using the term "lady patriarch" i kept imagining condoleeza rice walking around with a crown given to her by patriarchy]
- she focused a lot on the relationsip between feminism and pacifism
- she looked at feminism's "then and now" and spoke of how what has yet to change are the structures of power (such as the welcoming patriarchal structures of the military)
- she said there has been a change in outlook, and that male attitudes have started changing, but that's not enough (lady patriarchs are so dangerous because they play into the structures, but give the false image of change)
- structures also have a built-in avoidance of really hearing these changed attitudes... [a great line that, as an english student, i just ate up: "there's no point to represent into a vacuum"]
- in response to a question she talked about the relationship between feminism and many religious structures which, by pre-existing government, are original sources of patriarchal authority, that there are inherent similarities between the patriarchal authority of religions and government. so feminism is at odds with this "management structure" of religions. however, feminsim can find compassion with the welfare function of religion-- with notions of love, understanding, and listening.
okay that's part one of my post. my sister needs her comp, and i'm currently mac-less after my keyboard had a run-in with my morning (afternoon) espresso. so i'll post some more points in a bit! sheetal :)
okay here's part two!
- michele landsberg asked: what will the next generation do to change structures?
- dr. franklin responded with this really delicious discussion on 'mechanical vs. organic' understandings of how the world works. she said she hoped our generation of feminists would build on a genuine understanding of the difference between a mechanism and an organism (a difference that women will find if we can find a way to express/represent it properly)... the way our culture works now, is we see things working like a clock, where we believe that, if we are clever enough and put the parts in right, and give it the right kick, it'll work.... but that's not how life works. dr. franklin then starts to talk about looking to our gardens, that life is made up of organisms who grow together, malfunction together, it's not as if we are separate parts that you can just jam together... things work because we grow together, learn together... there's a limit to the tinkering, and a different way of nurturing, just like you can't force carrots to grow, there are conditions necessary to make life possible. the next generation of feminists will say stop, look, listen, and understand that human society is an organism and not a mechanism. in this sense, there must be a commitment to collaborating, and not to pull the carrot out and then put it back in to say "grow more." and a refusal of violence and a commitment of dialogue is part of this. and the refusal to believe that one can fix something agianst what life knows. we need to learn the limits of mechanism, and it will be the garden that teaches.
- the next question was about what could be done about the worldwide epidemic of violence against women.
- dr. franklin discussed reducing the tools of violence (gun control/abolition), images of violence, the glorification of violence, using images of things like cartoon characters to remove the human experience from violence, and a de-escalation of noise and speed and things that lead to an avoidance of a human situation.
so these are just some of the really fascinating points of discussion that were raised during the discussion by this remarkable woman... thoughts?
a little bit more on dr franklin:
Join us in celebrating Dr. Ursula Franklin, the brilliant and visionary scientist and humanitarian, and social justice and peace advocate, whose feminism is an essential part of her life. A mentor and role model to generations of women in science, an activist Quaker and pacifist, her most recent book, The Ursula Franklin Reader: Pacifism as a Map (2006), will be a feminist classic.
Dr. Franklin is an inspiration to women and truly an example of someone who is not afraid to act on her convictions, and who helps to make this world a better place to live. She is University Professor Emerita at the University of Toronto and a Companion of the Order of Canada.
and more: wikipedia entry on dr. franklin
some really interesting ideas/anecdotes/thoughts were shared by dr franklin, who is truly a pleasure to listen to. here are some points i've managed to pull out from my pages of excited scribbles:
- dr franklin spoke of seeing feminism as a social ordering vastly different from patriarchy, and that it is not just an employment agency for women
- she pointed to the existence of "lady patriarchs" -- women who choose power over true feminist action and change [when she was using the term "lady patriarch" i kept imagining condoleeza rice walking around with a crown given to her by patriarchy]
- she focused a lot on the relationsip between feminism and pacifism
- she looked at feminism's "then and now" and spoke of how what has yet to change are the structures of power (such as the welcoming patriarchal structures of the military)
- she said there has been a change in outlook, and that male attitudes have started changing, but that's not enough (lady patriarchs are so dangerous because they play into the structures, but give the false image of change)
- structures also have a built-in avoidance of really hearing these changed attitudes... [a great line that, as an english student, i just ate up: "there's no point to represent into a vacuum"]
- in response to a question she talked about the relationship between feminism and many religious structures which, by pre-existing government, are original sources of patriarchal authority, that there are inherent similarities between the patriarchal authority of religions and government. so feminism is at odds with this "management structure" of religions. however, feminsim can find compassion with the welfare function of religion-- with notions of love, understanding, and listening.
okay that's part one of my post. my sister needs her comp, and i'm currently mac-less after my keyboard had a run-in with my morning (afternoon) espresso. so i'll post some more points in a bit! sheetal :)
okay here's part two!
- michele landsberg asked: what will the next generation do to change structures?
- dr. franklin responded with this really delicious discussion on 'mechanical vs. organic' understandings of how the world works. she said she hoped our generation of feminists would build on a genuine understanding of the difference between a mechanism and an organism (a difference that women will find if we can find a way to express/represent it properly)... the way our culture works now, is we see things working like a clock, where we believe that, if we are clever enough and put the parts in right, and give it the right kick, it'll work.... but that's not how life works. dr. franklin then starts to talk about looking to our gardens, that life is made up of organisms who grow together, malfunction together, it's not as if we are separate parts that you can just jam together... things work because we grow together, learn together... there's a limit to the tinkering, and a different way of nurturing, just like you can't force carrots to grow, there are conditions necessary to make life possible. the next generation of feminists will say stop, look, listen, and understand that human society is an organism and not a mechanism. in this sense, there must be a commitment to collaborating, and not to pull the carrot out and then put it back in to say "grow more." and a refusal of violence and a commitment of dialogue is part of this. and the refusal to believe that one can fix something agianst what life knows. we need to learn the limits of mechanism, and it will be the garden that teaches.
- the next question was about what could be done about the worldwide epidemic of violence against women.
- dr. franklin discussed reducing the tools of violence (gun control/abolition), images of violence, the glorification of violence, using images of things like cartoon characters to remove the human experience from violence, and a de-escalation of noise and speed and things that lead to an avoidance of a human situation.
so these are just some of the really fascinating points of discussion that were raised during the discussion by this remarkable woman... thoughts?
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Updates and reflections from the Town Hall
Thanks to everyone who read the liveblogging Sheetal and I did from the Town Hall last night. Re-reading it now, the number of typos and sentences-that-don't-make-any sense is downright embarassing, but I'm just going to leave it up as-is. Just to preserve the memory of the intense rush of it, just a little bit.. haha.
Also thank you to everyone commenting to let us know who the speakers were. I felt so bad beacuse I did such a bad job at catching people's names (and even when I did catch them, more likely than not brutally misspelling them). So thank you and please keep commenting!
Now to the update. First off, yesterday afternoon, sometime between a meeting I had with Fab Dolan and the Town Hall meeting at 7, the USC and the Gazette both released press releases with official, for-real-this-time apologies:
From Ian Van Den Hurk, Editor-in-Chief:
The USC has also claimed accountabilty and USC President Fab Dolan has officially apologized. He also notes that reforms will be in place by September 1st (aka before the Gazette can publish another issue) and that the reports of the planned study groups will be ready by November, to give students time for input (as a good chunk of students aren't around in the summer). Most people at yesterday's meeting hadn't heard about this yet so Fab Dolan read them off.
So now for some much more coherent reflections on last night's meeting. I'll make sure to stick in lots of comments about the "patriarchal framework" because I know our readers just LOVE that :)
Also, this is long. Apologies. I wish blogger would let us put some of this behind a cut or jump.
So many speakers brought up so many good points and were so powerful and inspiring. I was really happy to hear several speakers put this event into context by bringing up past offenses of the Gazette, while most speakers talked about how this was indicative of a larger atmosphere at this university, and gave examples. I was also happy to hear someone say very clearly to the administration (and this was Kat Mitrow) that sure they care now, but if it wasn't for the work of so many "dedicated and sleepless women" (tell me about it) this would have just slipped through the cracks.
Some things that were said made me cringe just a little bit. Like when someone said that the Gazette hasn't proven itself mature enough to have a newspaper and it should be taken away from them. The student journalist in me (and yes, believe it or not, lover of free speech!) shuddered just a touch at that. There are so many students on this campus who could do a better job with the Gazette, and if the Gazette could be institutionally restructed to allow more student voices, the input of a more diverse student population, and to stick to an anti-oppression policy, I think that the potential for the Gazette to actually counteract (as opposed to contribute to) the dominant atmosphere at Western could, potentially start to outweigh some of the pain and hurt it's caused.
Additionally, some people suggested that we should cancel the Sex and Spoof issues. Perhaps. The Gazette has clearly shown that year after year it can't do these issues without being grossly offensive and stupid. But personally, I think that it would be much better, and more of a challenge, to have the Gazette publish a fantastic Sex Issue, one that is sex-positive, diverse, non-heteronormative or heterosexist, and that doesn't need to objectify women to be "sexy." (For example Trent's newspaper Arthur just published a supplement of self-representation of queer populations that included a lot of racy sex-related stuff... Actually they recevied a lot of flack for it. Don't you wish we had that kind of thing to argue over in our student publication instead of this?) I'd also love to see a fantastic Spoof Issue, with really well written, well done satire.
I also thought it was kind of (kind of) a shame that no one spoke from the "this isn't offensive this is free speech" side. I know there are plenty of people who feel that way so it's a shame no one showed up to defend their side. I guess freedom of speech is a lot easier to whine about than to actually practice, huh?
There were representatives from the administration (including President Paul Davenport) and the USC (President Fab Dolan), but no one from the Gazette. I understand that Editor-in-Chief Ian Van Den Hurk didn't go because he didn't want to co-opt the discussion (and he's right it, probably would've turned into a witch hunt), but I have to say that I do think it was really shameful that not a single person from the Gazette was there (and if they were, they didn't speak). The administration is responsible, the USC is responsible -- but ultimately the Gazette is the most responsible, and Ian Van Den Hurk most of all, and at the very least he (and preferably other editors) should have been there.
First, let's talk about the administration, specifically Paul Davenport. And on that note, I've found the ostrich and dinosaur picture I was talking about. I think it's a good image to reflect how I feel about this part of the night.
Unfortunately it seemed to me that Davenport hadn't heard a single thing in the meeting that night. He just doesn't seem to get it, and if he does it ain't coming across. One woman at the meeting spoke about how she feels like a lot of the administration members are "dinosaurs" when it comes to their views on women's rights and feminism (and women's studies) and after that I couldn't help but see Davenport-as-dino all night. His speeches, particularly his closing speech, just screamed "I don't understand this" -- at the same time as he clearly thought he did, as he clearly spoke with a certain amount of assumed authority, the way, I image, he speaks on everything.
I watched him, in his speeches and speaking to him afterwards as well, really struggle for the "right" language to talk about these issues, and he clearly just doesn't have it. Again, he doesn't get it, but he's also not, it's clear, had the education or exposure necessary for him to really understand where everyone is coming from on this one. He hasn't had that "ah ha!" moment where it clicks and he gets it, and he hasn't had clearly any kind of education in issues that would allow him to speak with any intelligence, let alone authority on it.
Which, I might add, is no one's fault but his own. It's not our responsibility to educate him, it's his responsibility to listen and to learn. Which is why his responses "we can do this but we need your help" (of course you need our help, you don't understand, but you need our help to help you understand, and then you're the one who has to take resopnsibility and action... but who exactly is "your" [in "your help"] in that sentence anyway? women? faculty? students?) ... and "men must be front and centre on this issue" (what? I think he's trying to say that men can't think that this is only a women's issue, which of course it ISN'T, but to say that men need to be front and centre on this, while so many dedicated women have been organizing and mobilizing around this for the last week, just wanting the big powerful men like Dr. D to listen to us, not to tell us what to do - is just insulting). It was also clearly a linguistic failure (rooted in an ideological failure) when he said he was glad to see so many groups "working for the weaker people of our society," which (not surprisingly) attracted a round of boos. His choice of the word "weaker" there, so clearly echoing "the weaker sex" was just so wrong.
Again, I feel like he is just extremely uneducated on these issues, but moreso that he had a very real opportunity last night a) to realize and own up to his own ignorance, and then b) to get some education, if he had just listened (and I'm sure this isn't the first opportunity he's had to do that, of course). His closing speech said to me that he hadn't really listened at all, which is a shame/shameful.
More importantly though, it's downright shameful that the someone who is the President of our university is not already educated on these issues. Full stop. (Though it does seem to explain a lot about the nature of this university.)
In contrast, Fab Dolan spoke with much more grace. Both men chose their words very carefully, but, well, Fab didn't call us the weaker sex so he kind of already wins. From having spoken now to several people who were there, the general sense seems to be that, unlike Davenport, Fab might finally be starting to "get it" -- and that is my impression too, having now had the chance to meet with him twice. He spoke with a lot of heart, talked about how this past week has made him learn a lot about the experiences of female and queer students on campus, and about how he's learned that life isn't all like they teach you at business school. (And I'll reiterate, why can't they teach them ALL this at Ivey?!)
Here's the difference: Fab was listening, clearly. His final speech particularly reflected that, but just in general I feel like he's done a lot of listening, and learning, this past week. He comes across to a lot of people as a smooth talking politician a lot of the time I think, but I honestly believe that our dear Mr. President has been deeply changed by this whole event -- and that that's not just spin. Most of us feminists remember that week that a friend of mine calls her "Butler week" -- you know, that week when your mind was blown by a feminist analysis of some kind and then suddenly the way you saw the whole world changed. Maybe it's naive of me, but I think Fab may be experiencing his own kind of Butler week this week.
And you know, that gives me a lot of hope, both for this school and for Ivey students everywhere .... ;)
I also have a lot of hope for the plans the USC has committed to putting in place to do some serious reexamining of the Gazette's policies and practices. I think we will absolutely need to continue to put pressure on the USC to make sure these study groups are as thorough and as brutal (in their reconstruction of the Gazette) as they have the potential to be, but it's actually very exciting to me to see that for the first time, we're actually doing something to change UWO's "untouchable paper" (as Fab called it).
No, it's not perfect. I regret that Ian Van Den Hurk has not resigned (and at this point, it doesn't look terribly likely, but I'm still holding out hope). But it's something.
Given the nature of this world, the reality is that we feminists have a lot of rage. We just do, because there's a lot to be rageful about, quite legitimately so, once you start seeing it. When something like this happens, you have to scream at the top of your lungs. There's so much rage that you can barely contain it all, and you need somewhere to channel it. The frustrating thing about this event has been, in part, that there haven't been a lot of channels to put that rage into. We feel like screaming and we need someont to scream at -- the editor, most definitely, and his mostly-lack-of-response has been frustrating and disappointing. The administration and the USC, yes, but they don't have the power to do a whole lot to "punish" the Gazette or Van Den Hurk in this instance (so our lust for blood remains unsatisfied, lol ;).
But the thing is, I think we are making some ground on this issue. The apologies, the USC's plans to seriously restructure the Gazette -- these are all amazing steps that (shoudl have but) couldn't have happened without all the uproar we've created around this issue. The problem is that the world isn't perfect now, this issue isn't even totally fixed, so we're still filled with rage that our society doesn't let us get out very often. And once you let the floodgates go, you have a critical mass of feminists who are pissed off, about this but also about the state of the world in general.
Strategically, I think that we as feminsts need to appreciate and recognize ground when we get it, and this is ground, if only a tiny patch of it. This is FAR from over, but we have the opportunity here, potentially, to make some real change to the Gazette by working with them and with the USC. While our rage over this issue, still so much of it unsastified, is still important and crucial, I think it's important that we recognize what we've achieved and that we applaud those who have worked with us.
Also thank you to everyone commenting to let us know who the speakers were. I felt so bad beacuse I did such a bad job at catching people's names (and even when I did catch them, more likely than not brutally misspelling them). So thank you and please keep commenting!
Now to the update. First off, yesterday afternoon, sometime between a meeting I had with Fab Dolan and the Town Hall meeting at 7, the USC and the Gazette both released press releases with official, for-real-this-time apologies:
From Ian Van Den Hurk, Editor-in-Chief:
"I wish to formally apologize for hurting Western students, the University Students' Council, The University of Western Ontario and members of the greater community... While the issue was not written with malicious intent toward any individuals or groups, nor the reputations of either the University of Western Ontario or the University Student's Council, I fully understand and recognize the pain it has caused. I am truly sorry."
The USC has also claimed accountabilty and USC President Fab Dolan has officially apologized. He also notes that reforms will be in place by September 1st (aka before the Gazette can publish another issue) and that the reports of the planned study groups will be ready by November, to give students time for input (as a good chunk of students aren't around in the summer). Most people at yesterday's meeting hadn't heard about this yet so Fab Dolan read them off.
So now for some much more coherent reflections on last night's meeting. I'll make sure to stick in lots of comments about the "patriarchal framework" because I know our readers just LOVE that :)
Also, this is long. Apologies. I wish blogger would let us put some of this behind a cut or jump.
So many speakers brought up so many good points and were so powerful and inspiring. I was really happy to hear several speakers put this event into context by bringing up past offenses of the Gazette, while most speakers talked about how this was indicative of a larger atmosphere at this university, and gave examples. I was also happy to hear someone say very clearly to the administration (and this was Kat Mitrow) that sure they care now, but if it wasn't for the work of so many "dedicated and sleepless women" (tell me about it) this would have just slipped through the cracks.
Some things that were said made me cringe just a little bit. Like when someone said that the Gazette hasn't proven itself mature enough to have a newspaper and it should be taken away from them. The student journalist in me (and yes, believe it or not, lover of free speech!) shuddered just a touch at that. There are so many students on this campus who could do a better job with the Gazette, and if the Gazette could be institutionally restructed to allow more student voices, the input of a more diverse student population, and to stick to an anti-oppression policy, I think that the potential for the Gazette to actually counteract (as opposed to contribute to) the dominant atmosphere at Western could, potentially start to outweigh some of the pain and hurt it's caused.
Additionally, some people suggested that we should cancel the Sex and Spoof issues. Perhaps. The Gazette has clearly shown that year after year it can't do these issues without being grossly offensive and stupid. But personally, I think that it would be much better, and more of a challenge, to have the Gazette publish a fantastic Sex Issue, one that is sex-positive, diverse, non-heteronormative or heterosexist, and that doesn't need to objectify women to be "sexy." (For example Trent's newspaper Arthur just published a supplement of self-representation of queer populations that included a lot of racy sex-related stuff... Actually they recevied a lot of flack for it. Don't you wish we had that kind of thing to argue over in our student publication instead of this?) I'd also love to see a fantastic Spoof Issue, with really well written, well done satire.
I also thought it was kind of (kind of) a shame that no one spoke from the "this isn't offensive this is free speech" side. I know there are plenty of people who feel that way so it's a shame no one showed up to defend their side. I guess freedom of speech is a lot easier to whine about than to actually practice, huh?
There were representatives from the administration (including President Paul Davenport) and the USC (President Fab Dolan), but no one from the Gazette. I understand that Editor-in-Chief Ian Van Den Hurk didn't go because he didn't want to co-opt the discussion (and he's right it, probably would've turned into a witch hunt), but I have to say that I do think it was really shameful that not a single person from the Gazette was there (and if they were, they didn't speak). The administration is responsible, the USC is responsible -- but ultimately the Gazette is the most responsible, and Ian Van Den Hurk most of all, and at the very least he (and preferably other editors) should have been there.
First, let's talk about the administration, specifically Paul Davenport. And on that note, I've found the ostrich and dinosaur picture I was talking about. I think it's a good image to reflect how I feel about this part of the night.
Unfortunately it seemed to me that Davenport hadn't heard a single thing in the meeting that night. He just doesn't seem to get it, and if he does it ain't coming across. One woman at the meeting spoke about how she feels like a lot of the administration members are "dinosaurs" when it comes to their views on women's rights and feminism (and women's studies) and after that I couldn't help but see Davenport-as-dino all night. His speeches, particularly his closing speech, just screamed "I don't understand this" -- at the same time as he clearly thought he did, as he clearly spoke with a certain amount of assumed authority, the way, I image, he speaks on everything.
I watched him, in his speeches and speaking to him afterwards as well, really struggle for the "right" language to talk about these issues, and he clearly just doesn't have it. Again, he doesn't get it, but he's also not, it's clear, had the education or exposure necessary for him to really understand where everyone is coming from on this one. He hasn't had that "ah ha!" moment where it clicks and he gets it, and he hasn't had clearly any kind of education in issues that would allow him to speak with any intelligence, let alone authority on it.
Which, I might add, is no one's fault but his own. It's not our responsibility to educate him, it's his responsibility to listen and to learn. Which is why his responses "we can do this but we need your help" (of course you need our help, you don't understand, but you need our help to help you understand, and then you're the one who has to take resopnsibility and action... but who exactly is "your" [in "your help"] in that sentence anyway? women? faculty? students?) ... and "men must be front and centre on this issue" (what? I think he's trying to say that men can't think that this is only a women's issue, which of course it ISN'T, but to say that men need to be front and centre on this, while so many dedicated women have been organizing and mobilizing around this for the last week, just wanting the big powerful men like Dr. D to listen to us, not to tell us what to do - is just insulting). It was also clearly a linguistic failure (rooted in an ideological failure) when he said he was glad to see so many groups "working for the weaker people of our society," which (not surprisingly) attracted a round of boos. His choice of the word "weaker" there, so clearly echoing "the weaker sex" was just so wrong.
Again, I feel like he is just extremely uneducated on these issues, but moreso that he had a very real opportunity last night a) to realize and own up to his own ignorance, and then b) to get some education, if he had just listened (and I'm sure this isn't the first opportunity he's had to do that, of course). His closing speech said to me that he hadn't really listened at all, which is a shame/shameful.
More importantly though, it's downright shameful that the someone who is the President of our university is not already educated on these issues. Full stop. (Though it does seem to explain a lot about the nature of this university.)
In contrast, Fab Dolan spoke with much more grace. Both men chose their words very carefully, but, well, Fab didn't call us the weaker sex so he kind of already wins. From having spoken now to several people who were there, the general sense seems to be that, unlike Davenport, Fab might finally be starting to "get it" -- and that is my impression too, having now had the chance to meet with him twice. He spoke with a lot of heart, talked about how this past week has made him learn a lot about the experiences of female and queer students on campus, and about how he's learned that life isn't all like they teach you at business school. (And I'll reiterate, why can't they teach them ALL this at Ivey?!)
Here's the difference: Fab was listening, clearly. His final speech particularly reflected that, but just in general I feel like he's done a lot of listening, and learning, this past week. He comes across to a lot of people as a smooth talking politician a lot of the time I think, but I honestly believe that our dear Mr. President has been deeply changed by this whole event -- and that that's not just spin. Most of us feminists remember that week that a friend of mine calls her "Butler week" -- you know, that week when your mind was blown by a feminist analysis of some kind and then suddenly the way you saw the whole world changed. Maybe it's naive of me, but I think Fab may be experiencing his own kind of Butler week this week.
And you know, that gives me a lot of hope, both for this school and for Ivey students everywhere .... ;)
I also have a lot of hope for the plans the USC has committed to putting in place to do some serious reexamining of the Gazette's policies and practices. I think we will absolutely need to continue to put pressure on the USC to make sure these study groups are as thorough and as brutal (in their reconstruction of the Gazette) as they have the potential to be, but it's actually very exciting to me to see that for the first time, we're actually doing something to change UWO's "untouchable paper" (as Fab called it).
No, it's not perfect. I regret that Ian Van Den Hurk has not resigned (and at this point, it doesn't look terribly likely, but I'm still holding out hope). But it's something.
Given the nature of this world, the reality is that we feminists have a lot of rage. We just do, because there's a lot to be rageful about, quite legitimately so, once you start seeing it. When something like this happens, you have to scream at the top of your lungs. There's so much rage that you can barely contain it all, and you need somewhere to channel it. The frustrating thing about this event has been, in part, that there haven't been a lot of channels to put that rage into. We feel like screaming and we need someont to scream at -- the editor, most definitely, and his mostly-lack-of-response has been frustrating and disappointing. The administration and the USC, yes, but they don't have the power to do a whole lot to "punish" the Gazette or Van Den Hurk in this instance (so our lust for blood remains unsatisfied, lol ;).
But the thing is, I think we are making some ground on this issue. The apologies, the USC's plans to seriously restructure the Gazette -- these are all amazing steps that (shoudl have but) couldn't have happened without all the uproar we've created around this issue. The problem is that the world isn't perfect now, this issue isn't even totally fixed, so we're still filled with rage that our society doesn't let us get out very often. And once you let the floodgates go, you have a critical mass of feminists who are pissed off, about this but also about the state of the world in general.
Strategically, I think that we as feminsts need to appreciate and recognize ground when we get it, and this is ground, if only a tiny patch of it. This is FAR from over, but we have the opportunity here, potentially, to make some real change to the Gazette by working with them and with the USC. While our rage over this issue, still so much of it unsastified, is still important and crucial, I think it's important that we recognize what we've achieved and that we applaud those who have worked with us.
Friday, April 13, 2007
8:58 pm
Um so basically Davenport's response so far is that it was "really useful for him" to hear from everyone. And how he's "old pals" with Faulkner and its important that we recognize how hard he works. OK...
He's talking about his condemnation of the newspaper and how he respects the autonomy of the student press... but now from the 150 emails he got, that makes no sense. Um, what? His he at the same meeting? No one's calling for the end of the autonomy of the student press? I'm sorry, but I can't help but seeing a giant dinosaur standing up in front of me right now... :P
OK OK he's talking. Something about how "he'll try to find the resources." The crowd doesn't like him very much. He probably shouldn't have called us the weaker sex. (Dinosaur!) He udnerstands that we're not satsified with teh institutional arrangements, and that he's going to "work on them." Yawn.
Now he's talking about how this isn't just about the Gazette and how this is about the climate. He wants to address this, but we need your help and consultation on this! Well, that's fabulous Paul. I'm glad to hear it. Double yawn.
Provost Fred Longstaff (giggle) is speaking now. He's committed to running an education institution that will respect the safety and justice of all. He's refrencing a speaker who said that s/he hopes that this has an impact, and he commits to us that they will do that as well - but again, they'll need our help. I'm not really sure who they're addressing - women? teh gayz? students? staff?
Fab's concluding remarks now. He thanks everyone for coming and for contacting him throughout the week. He seems so beaten down by this, I wonder if the crowd thinks if that's genuine or a spin. He's talking about the power of words and how we should choose our words carefully. He's talking now about how what he's really learned from this is that the world ain't like he was taught in business school (oh why can't they teach them ALL that at Ivey?) He's talking about how he's learned so much about women's rights, the rightrs of gays and lesbians etc. etc. and he ensures us that the power of OUR words is making them (the USC) take action against the paper everyone once though was untouchable. In looking at solutions, he's saying, we need to look at the mentality of "keep teaching." This past week has opened up a window to a world that he never knew, never knew the realities of etc.. More about the importance of teaching and education. He recognizes that "that equity just isn't there" and he "can't say with more sincerity how terrible the inequity is that so many of my students are afraid to stay late to study on campus tonight, that's inequity that we need to start addresing." He wants students to keep talking and emailing him and he wants to keep talking about more solutions. In closing... (and he's choosing his words soo carefully here) - he says that none of this is spin. He's committed to doing what he's said he'd do, taking steps to make this is a reputable and equitable paper. "A student paper has so much potential and we have to harness that potential."
Sheetal: Well, he defintiely showed so much more grace than Davenport.
And yeah he's probably lucky Davenport is such an ass :P
Well, that's it folks. The last message "please continue to be part of the change, to permit is to promote."
There's a room now for debriefing afterwards and we'll be heading off to that. Thanks for tuning in folks! More updates later on our reflections.
He's talking about his condemnation of the newspaper and how he respects the autonomy of the student press... but now from the 150 emails he got, that makes no sense. Um, what? His he at the same meeting? No one's calling for the end of the autonomy of the student press? I'm sorry, but I can't help but seeing a giant dinosaur standing up in front of me right now... :P
OK OK he's talking. Something about how "he'll try to find the resources." The crowd doesn't like him very much. He probably shouldn't have called us the weaker sex. (Dinosaur!) He udnerstands that we're not satsified with teh institutional arrangements, and that he's going to "work on them." Yawn.
Now he's talking about how this isn't just about the Gazette and how this is about the climate. He wants to address this, but we need your help and consultation on this! Well, that's fabulous Paul. I'm glad to hear it. Double yawn.
Provost Fred Longstaff (giggle) is speaking now. He's committed to running an education institution that will respect the safety and justice of all. He's refrencing a speaker who said that s/he hopes that this has an impact, and he commits to us that they will do that as well - but again, they'll need our help. I'm not really sure who they're addressing - women? teh gayz? students? staff?
Fab's concluding remarks now. He thanks everyone for coming and for contacting him throughout the week. He seems so beaten down by this, I wonder if the crowd thinks if that's genuine or a spin. He's talking about the power of words and how we should choose our words carefully. He's talking now about how what he's really learned from this is that the world ain't like he was taught in business school (oh why can't they teach them ALL that at Ivey?) He's talking about how he's learned so much about women's rights, the rightrs of gays and lesbians etc. etc. and he ensures us that the power of OUR words is making them (the USC) take action against the paper everyone once though was untouchable. In looking at solutions, he's saying, we need to look at the mentality of "keep teaching." This past week has opened up a window to a world that he never knew, never knew the realities of etc.. More about the importance of teaching and education. He recognizes that "that equity just isn't there" and he "can't say with more sincerity how terrible the inequity is that so many of my students are afraid to stay late to study on campus tonight, that's inequity that we need to start addresing." He wants students to keep talking and emailing him and he wants to keep talking about more solutions. In closing... (and he's choosing his words soo carefully here) - he says that none of this is spin. He's committed to doing what he's said he'd do, taking steps to make this is a reputable and equitable paper. "A student paper has so much potential and we have to harness that potential."
Sheetal: Well, he defintiely showed so much more grace than Davenport.
And yeah he's probably lucky Davenport is such an ass :P
Well, that's it folks. The last message "please continue to be part of the change, to permit is to promote."
There's a room now for debriefing afterwards and we'll be heading off to that. Thanks for tuning in folks! More updates later on our reflections.
8:52 pm
Oops! Davenport just said that women's groups are working to protect "weaker people in our society." and the crowd booed. Fuck yeah the crowd booed! Um, I think he just threw any chance of being genuine here out the window...
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