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Thoughtful and thought-provoking, Fiona McFarlane's The Sun Walks Down asks of the reader: Is art more important than life? What is the nature of courage? How should an individual relate to their own environment?
This bias continues to be so prevalent not only because medicine is a reflection of society, but because medicine was created with cisgender white neurotypical able-bodied men as the baseline. Those underlying assumptions are still baked into medical systems and filter down to all aspects of medicine.
In our foetal-centric antenatal model, the health and wellbeing of the person giving birth are secondary considerations, stemming in part from a belief that suffering is a defining characteristic of childbirth. But what if a 'safe delivery' meant not just a healthy baby, but a healthy mother too?
In feminist circles, period shaming and the pros and cons of alternative menstrual products are well-trodden topics. So when I watched the ad from Libra, I saw it for what it was: a mainstream response to a movement that had been going on for years. The #bloodnormal campaign isn't revolutionary. It is, however, still necessary.
Headlines celebrating Gladys Berejiklian as the first female elected as Premier of NSW exemplify how far we have come and still have to go with women in politics. That women are held to a different, higher standard than men is evident in all facets of society, but in the political sphere it is a test of worthiness.
Curve it the way neck curves to shoulders, like the inside of an elbow, like a valley in spring. And send it out like glorious orphan; hovering in the style of infinite with no immediate purpose in mind in the unsubtle audacity of now.
We can assume that despite the recent Synod's focus on families, most of the voters have never had any involvement in raising families, and certainly not of experiencing pregnancy and childbirth. None have directly dealt with an abusive spouse, struggled to regulate family size, questioned whether to stay in an unhappy marriage, or dealt with a child identifying as gay, lesbian or transgender. Last year, I spent time working in a parish in Paraguay, where, unlike the church more broadly, women run the show.
'In chapter 12 "Respecting Autonomy and Protecting the Vulnerability of the Dying", Frank quoted my grandmother ... "Well there is not much to say about euthanasia is there? Just don't kill people and look after them while they are dying. What more can you say?" Well Grandma, I am not certain that I share your view. Just as Pope Francis did not know all the answers at age 36 years, neither do I.' Frank Brennan's nieces Shannon and Kateena help launch his new book Amplifying That Still, Small Voice.
I was sent to St Margaret's Home for Unwed Girls, and when I didn’t buckle to pressure to surrender my son for adoption, I was tossed onto the street. I went from rock bottom to rise to the top of my field, only to have everything pulled from underneath me. I managed to get back up again and realise my childhood dream of one day becoming a writer, lending a voice to tens of thousands of young women who lost their children in what is now known as 'forced adoption'.
When Bill Heffernan said that Julia Gillard was unfit for leadership because she was 'deliberately barren', he didn't really err. He just named our preoccupation with motherhood. But is the drive to procreate so powerful and important that it should override the integrity of women in developing countries? Should it continue to be the defining quality of women?
ANZAC Day is a powerful and worthy ritual. But the tales of our soldiers make up only one of the ongoing chapters in the story of our country. There are many others. On 25 January, let us remember the Indigenous people who once nurtured the land. On 25 February, let us remember those who gave their lives in settling this unforgiving land. On 25 March, let us remember the people who lost their lives migrating to this country.
For all the intrusions this tiny prince will have to endure in the years that stretch ahead, there will exist, as a salve of sorts, the incalculable benefits that his social status has randomly afforded him. We shouldn't diminish the joy of the royal couple, but we should be wary of allowing our sustained and fawning attention to further entrench the idea that some people are inherently more valuable than others.