~ One Woman~ A dedication to the Women of DU.

[Violet_Crumble]

140. This is for all the feminists who I admire and respect...

And for the woman who's always been closest to me, who was raped by a stranger as a child and grew up to be the strongest woman I know. Feminism is about equality and strength, and fighting to keep and improve the gains that have been made since the days of my mother and grandmother. At least that's what feminism means to me...

I hope that what's happened is solely a communication breakdown (actually that's one of the few songs from the 70's I like). I'll offer this post in that spirit and you can do with it as you will...

"This for all the beautiful wonderful men that take our backs every damn day. Dayum there are so many here Violet! Sadly you don't know them."

There's some good blokes at DU. Having been here since pretty much the start, I know pretty much all long-term DUers, so I think yr wrong on that one...

here ya go~ for us bland and insipid women that mean crap to you.

I never said women were bland and insipid and meant crap to me. I recall saying that Helen Reddy's music was bland and insipid, which being on a par with Olivia Newton John and the early Bee Gees, it was. Having an aversion to mainstream early 70's music doesn't turn me into someone who thinks women are bland and insipid.

You were to young to know the women that built what you are standing on today. Wow that's sad Violet as you too are a woman.

Well, the problem there is you've copied and pasted a timeline of the American women's rights movement. I'm not an American. I live in a country where we have our own history, was one of the first countries to get the vote, and have already had a female Prime Minister. So, this is what I'm familiar with.

31 October 1827
First Female Workers Riot
First Female Workers Riot occured at the Parramatta Female Factory over conditions and food deprivation.

1884
First Australian Suffrage Society
Henrietta Dugdale and Annie Lowe formed the Victorian Women’s Suffrage Society

20 July 1888
Organising women’s suffrage in South Australia
Women’s Suffrage League formed in South Australia

21 March 1895
Votes for women in South Australia
The proclamation of South Australia’s Suffrage Act, assented to by Queen Victoria on 2 February, gave women an equal right with men to vote, and to stand for election to the Colony’s House of Assembly.

Women with property could also vote in Legislative Council elections, but women could not stand for the upper House of the parliament until 1959.

15 May 1900
Women win the vote in Western Australia
West Australian women win the vote in WA elections with Queen Victoria’s assent to the Bill passed by the WA parliament on 15 December 1899

9 July 1900
Australian Constitution
Queen Victoria’s Assent enacts the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution

12 June 1902
Federal suffrage
Commonwealth Franchise Act grants right to vote and stand for election for the Australian parliament to women on the same basis as men, with Aboriginal people in some States still without this right

16 December 1903
First Australian women stand for federal parliament elections
Vida Goldstein, Nellie Martel, and Mary Ann Moore Bentley stand for the Senate, and Selina Siggins for the seat of Dalley in the House of Representatives

29 February 1904
Votes for women in Tasmania
Tasmanian women won an equal right with men to vote in elections for the House of Assembly. Women with property were eligible to vote for the Legislative Council and from 29 October 1920 those who served in the 1914-18 war were also eligible to vote for the upper House. An equal right to stand for election to both Houses was won two years later.

23 October 1907
Australian Exhibition of Women’s Work opens
Opening of the Australian Exhibition of Women’s Work in Melbourne by Lady Northcote, with Pattie Deakin running a model creche during the five-week exhibition showcasing the work of musicians, artists and craftswomen

31 March 1909
Votes for women in Victoria
Women in Victoria won an equal right with men to vote in State elections. Only women who met the propery qualification could vote in Legislative Council elections. Victorian women won an equal right o stand for election to both Houses of their State parliament in 1924.

12 March 1921
First woman elected to an Australian parliament
Edith Cowan (Nationalist, West Perth) became the first woman to be elected to an Australian parliament. She served in the Western Australian Legislative Assembly until 22 March 1924.

12 August 1921
Australian Federation of Women Voters
Bessie Rischbieth founded this federated body of Australian women’s political associations as a national group to liaise with international feminist organisations and establish credentials as lobbyists and advisers at the League of Nations.

An immediate success of the AFWV was lobbying prime minister Billy Hughes to have a woman included on Australia’s delegations to the annual League of Nations General Assembly. From 1922 Australia was one of the few member nations to comply with the equailty provision in the covenant of the League in including a woman on each official delegation.

26 August 1925
First woman member speaks in the NSW Parliament
Millicent Preston-Stanley, elected to the NSW Legislative Assembly in May 1925, delivered her first speech two weeks after the opening of the parliament.

23 September 1943
First women elected to the federal parliament
Dame Enid Lyons becomes a member of the House of Representatives for the United Australia Party, and the Australian Labor Party’s Dorothy Tangney takes a seat in the Senate representing West Australia

1966
SA Council of Aboriginal Women
Founded by Gladys Elphick, a Kaurna descendant

1969
Zelda D’Aprano
In 1969, Zelda D’Aprano chained herslef to the Commonweath Building in Melbourne. 35 years later (2004) she was awarded the Officer of the Order of Australia in recognition of her campaigning on women’s workplace issues.

19 June 1969
Equal Pay
After decades of campaigning, Australian women workers win equal pay rates with men doing comparable work under an Arbitration Commission decision for incremental increases, with pay parity eventually achieved in 1972

February 1972
WEL
The Women’s Electoral Lobby (WEL) began in Feb 1972 when 10 women met in a femisnists home to disuss ways of playing a more influential role in the election planned for December that year.

31 August 1975
Australia celebrates International Women’s Day
The Australian Government held the first national conference from 31 August to 6 September in1975 on the status of women (Women and Politics) and committed Australia to celebrating International Women’s Day with other member nations of the United Nations.

The conference generated a great deal of debate in Australia. Some conference delegates invaded the offices of the Canberra Times to protest about the coverage of the conference.

25 April 1981
ANZAC Day. Women arrested while marching to remember women raped in war.
In the early ’80s, a number of Australian women attempted to join official ANZAC Day marches because they wanted to commemorate all women who had been raped in wars.

In 1980, fourteen women who tried to do this in Canberra were arrested. The following year, again in Canberra, around 250 women attempted to join the tail of the official ANZAC Day march but were stopped by police and directed not to march. The police were acting under a Section 23A of the Traffic Ordinance, a section that had only been gazetted the day before the march. As a result about 64 people, mainly women, were arrrested and charged with failing to obey the police directive.

The special legislation, march and arrests that took place aroundthat Anzac Day in 1981 gave rise to a great deal of debate in the Canberra Times.

1983
Australia becomes CEDAW signatory
Australia becomes a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).

1 July 1989
National Foundation for Australian Women launched
The official launch of the National Foundation for Australian Women was at the National Press Club in Canberra on 1 July 1989. A series of mini-launches in all states and territories were held in the following six months.

8 March 2000
Women’s History Month 2000 launched
Hon. Margaret Reid, Senator for the ACT and President of the Senate, launched Women’s History Month in Parliament House Canberra.

12 February 2002
Women’s History Month 2002 launched

http://womenshistory.net.au/timeline/

Some of us have been on the floor I am talking beaten onto the floor, have you? I have. We got knocked down there but we got back up again and again, if you have then it is so very sad that you are amused by this song.

I have, but I'm not seeing why every woman who's ever been knocked down to the floor MUST like Helen Reddy. Women have different taste in music, and Helen Reddy and music from that era doesn't do it for me. I'm more from the Madonna era, and it's a shame you said we're done, as not only will you miss learning about the Australian women's movement, but yr about to miss out on some music that I guess speaks to me as a woman and a feminist, even though Madonna's been a bit patchy throughout her career and probably as mainstream as I get....

You have a wonderful life as well, sheshe. I'm always here if yr ever in the mood to learn about the Australian women's movement or get some good musical tips