03 June, 2009

Am I Doing Enough?

Am I doing enough? Am I working hard enough?

Every day women and girls are raped and beaten. Every day women and girls are murdered. Every day women and girls are sold into slavery. Every day physical, sexual and emotional abuse continues, our children treated as less than human, being scarred for years to come.

Every day young girls internalise messages of self-hatred and despair. Rates of suicide, depression, self-harm, eating disorders all continue to increase.

There are women and girls in the world who don't have the right to education, who don't have the right to a voice, who don't have reproductive freedom, who don't have the right to be seen in public.

And what do I do? I blog. I sit here on my privileged arse and whine.

Am I doing enough? Not even remotely.

It's time to start actual activism, focusing on things that matter. I don't know what yet. I don't know what I can do, or if I can do anything. But I have to try.

Cross posted to my livejournal.

4 comments:

Amelia said...

Hello, it's Amelia from Twitter. :)

I just wanted to say that I understand the feeling of, "Well, blogging isn't actually doing anything." But it's a great place to start. Blogging has helped open my eyes to all the problems in the world that I want to address as a feminist. It has also helped open a few other eyes. From there, we can figure out our activism as we will. I wish you luck on that.

Lissy said...

What issue are you most passionate about? Is there a way you can volunteer for an organisation that works in this area? You're in WA right? goes off to google....

http://www.communities.wa.gov.au/DFC/Communities/Women/Womens_Information_Service.htm

Try these people as a start. I have some familiarity with the SA equivalent- this might be a good place to either volunteer for or find an organisation to volunteer for.

Hope this is useful.

Pharaoh Katt said...

Amelia: Thank you for the support :) Blogging is what got me initially interested in feminism, so I guess it can't be that useless. But I do think that now it's really time for me to step up and start trying to make an active difference.

Lissy: Thanks for the info! I will definitely check them out :)
I honestly don't know what issue I'm most passionate about... But I will have a look at the org and see what it offers. Thanks again :)

Pharaoh Katt said...

Lissy: actually, that's not true. One issue I'm really passionate about is paid parental leave and access to affordable, quality child care. I will start with that.