Equality for Australian Women

Break down the barriers to get what you want from life

It was a real treat to hear Australia’s Anne Summers speak about the feminist movement and the state of equality in Australia and around the world today during the Bendigo Writers Festival.

One of the best things about this session was that there was a wide range of people that had come to hear Anne speak about women’s equality in Australia. Families with young children, teenagers and adults of both genders sat in the filled Capital Theatre to hear how far Australia has come and what more needs to be done.  

Anne’s book Damned Whores and God’s Police first published forty years ago, has undergone numerous reprints and updates, and is still popular today. Looking at society, first in the 1970’s and continuing until now, Damned Whores and God’s Police is a wealth of information about the past of women’s rights, liberation, roles and much more. For women to know and understand the past and how far society has come is important in moving forward and creating a better future for the next generations.

What about the society that we live in now. Is it any better than 40 years ago?

Well, society still holds on to colours representing gender types. Why do we as a community believe that we can only purchase pink items for girls and blue items for boys?

 I honestly cannot say.

Toy and clothing companies are creating items that are then marketed as being for a specific gender. This practice is outdated. We are now in a place in where gender is becoming irrelevant, once old enough to make their own decisions individuals now have the opportunity to dress in a way that expresses their personality and choose the toy’s they want. Sadly, this still comes as something that a minority of society bully people for, because they do not believe that they should play with or wear those colours or clothes.  

  

Not just children and teenagers are falling subject to needing to fit into society’s ideal model person. Adult women are regularly challenged on their life choices, especially when it comes to having a family. As Anne Summers explained during her session, the ultimate role for women is still motherhood; there is still a notion around that you are less of a woman if you have chosen not to have children.

With that being said, higher education, career paths and other options are being given to women across Australia, and many believe that it is possible men are the more successful applicants in these situations still, showing that while Australia has made some progress towards equality there is still much more to be done to make things fair.