Due to recent events with Metiria Turei, we have been hearing about the struggles that single parents experienced in the 1980s and 1990s. Those of us who lived those times as children are now adults; a lot of us will now be raising families of our own. I am the child of a solo mother, […]
During the United States primaries, I had to consciously limit my fascination with US politics and remind myself that it was getting daily updates on the campaign trail shenanigans wasn’t much different to reading about foreign celebrities inĀ gossip magazines. I had better things to do with my time and attention. And then Trump got elected. […]
New Zealand’s TV Guide got an enormous amount of attention this weekĀ (exactly the amount it was hoping for, presumably), when it published this letter: This hideous piece of throwback misogyny got all the condemnation and ridicule it deserved on Facebook yesterday (and more, no doubt: I’m not suggesting that social media response has […]
A friendĀ got in touch this morning about this article, gone viral, about a little boy standing up for a woman being verbally abused by a man in a street. I think this little guy is awesome, but I don’t find it a wholly positiveĀ story. See what you think: That was my trigger point. The B […]
In the middle of the (Thai) night, slightly out of kilter after all the flying, and up with jet-lagged (or rather, jet-fuelled) children, I got the very good news by email that the Advertising Standards Authority had upheld a swathe of complaints against this billboard: The advertisement, like several others for the services of this […]
[Update: we won! But there’s good news and bad news. My take on the decision is here.] I got my rant on yesterday and today I got my complain on. This is the text of my formal complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority. They’ve already refused to consider two complaints against this ad, so I […]
Sigh. I went to complain to the Advertising Standards Authority (yes, again) about a billboard where a naked woman’s body is used to sell… scaffolding. And cranes. And stuff like that. It came up in the feminist mothers’ Facebook group I’m part of. Lots of people were appalled at the billboard and had been complaining […]
Bill English announced in yesterday’s Budget that ‘work readiness’ obligations would increase for parents who receive welfare benefits and have young children. Currently, most parents are obliged to actively seek 15 hours of paid work – and accept any ‘suitable’ job – when their youngest child turns five years old (despite the legal age of […]
It seems that Jamie Oliver – cheeky television chef with the ‘beestung lips’ and the Essex accent – and I aren’t on the same page when it comes to our attitude to children. To put the differences between us starkly and bluntly, Iām not into assault, or punishment, or treating children as lesser humans. I […]
It’s not that this ‘health and safety’ advice from Wellington’s Massey University isn’t sensible, it’s just that it is absolutely insane that we live in a world where the solution to rape is female university studentsĀ being advised to carry a whistle and wear running shoes. University spokesman James Gardiner said … “If students don’t wish […]