Nicola Wilson-Jones
As I contemplate returning to competitive surfing, apprehension comes to the surface. I expect to wait all day, only to be told at dusk that female divisions will surf the following day and perhaps not until the day after that. I expect to compete with little support while male members of the clan are sought out and cheered on. I expect to read newspaper reports that make little mention of female divisions in surfing. And I expect to be judged always by men because there are still very few women on the judging panels of surfing competitions.
As part of the 2017 International Women’s Day celebrations at the Sydney Opera House, Geena Davis shared her extensive research about the representation of women and lack of female characters in a presentation called ‘The power of our media: How film and TV can help us achieve gender parity’. Davis implored creators to “add women on screen, behind the scenes as policy makers. Include women.”
Likewise in the world of sports. In surfing, though it may appear that women are present, the question needs to be asked: Are event organisers bringing a conscious practice to their craft in support of gender equality?
Miscarriage can be a difficult experience. It feels delicate for me still, although it has been several years since my last miscarriage. There is a silence that accompanies this kind of loss, a lack of conversation, a lack of acknowledgement, a problem of knowing how to say how it is, and to whom. Dolphins and whales tell their grief through action and their way of speaking has provided me – after a long time – with a way to find some human language to express my own ‘long swim’.
As a child of the 70s and 80s I was raised with the idea that women could (and did) do anything, and always eschewed the ‘traditional’ feminine trappings of makeup, skirts and heels. As I got older I became aware that this slogan was frequently understood to mean that women should do everything, including juggling work and family, but it was not until I started thinking about whether – and if – I wanted children that I fully realised the extent to which social attitudes towards motherhood remain among the most potent and pervasive constraints on female (and male) identity and freedom.
During her recent trip to the United Nations, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern used her speech to recommit the government to making New Zealand the “best place in the world to be a child”, ensuring that:
