1 JANUARY 2015
BY BELINDA PHIPPS, FAWCETT CHAIR 

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HAPPY NEW YEAR

It’s at this time when generally thoughts turn to all the so called good for us things that we promise ourselves we will get to “this year”.  You know, things like: I’m going to stick to the diet this time; I’m going to spend (more) time in the gym this year; I’m going to make sure I get my five a day come what may; I’m going to watch TV less and read more. All laudable intentions, and most of those I should be promising to do myself.

At Fawcett we will work tirelessly through 2015 to achieve our collective resolutions including:

THAT MEN AND WOMEN SEE THE BENEFITS OF FEMINISM TO THEM AS INDIVIDUALS AND TO SOCIETY 

But, what about replacing a couple of your own, or if you are strong willed enough, adding a few more which may help remind ourselves and others that what we are asking for is not that difficult and not that scary?

Here are some suggestions that we think are easily achievable in 2015 and we hope that you will take the ones you feel strongly about on board, and of course add your ideas to them.

• I will refuse to fill in Ms, Mrs, Miss or Mr on forms or answer the question to call centres unless my gender and marital status are of direct relevance to the matter in hand.
• I will make the effort to sign one of the following petitions, for example:http://www.5050parliament.co.uk and www.change.org/p/david-dinsmore-take-the-bare-boobs-out-of-the-sun-nomorepage3
• I will remember the women who struggled and died in this country, and those who in other countries to this day struggle and die to make sure that I and women throughout the world can be educated and vote – and I will respect those women by making sure I vote in the 2015 election and every other election after that
• I will follow my local Fawcett group on Facebook or Twitter and share or retweet
• I will have recruited at least five new Fawcett members by the end of the year.
• I will challenge the next sexist comment or joke I hear
• I will tweet my support for influential women in a senior position in politics, the law, the boardroom, or anywhere else using the hashtag #InspirationalWomen, include Fawcett in the tweet so that we can follow.
• I will tweet my support for men in public life who challenge sexism using #menwhosupportfeminism
• I will give a copy of one of these books to teenagers I know: Caitlin Moran’s How to Build a Girl or How to be a Woman; Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women; John Stuart Mill’s The Subjection of Women; Betty Friedan’sThe Feminine Mystique; Cordelia Fine’s Delusions of Gender… but there are lots more so you choose.
• If I can I will ask the company I work for to do a gender pay audit and publish it.
• I will encourage men who have recently become a parent to take their share of parental leave to be at home with their children
• I will share my knowledge of the domestic sphere and enable the men in my life to feel competent and capable in areas normally considered the preserve of women.
• I will encourage my sons and daughters and my nieces and nephews to stop praising girls just for looks and start to get to know their interests and their lives
• I will sign up to Inspiring Women http://www.inspiringthefuture.org/inspiring-women/ and speak in a school
• I will find an older woman who lived through the earlier feminist struggles and listen to her story to increase my resolve to change things for the future
• I will ask my children’s school to introduce a gender free uniform list so boys and girls have the same range of uniform to choose from
• I will expunge the phrase “big boys don’t cry” and similar from my vocabulary and encourage others around me to do likewise
• I will ask every shop that identifies some toys as girls and some as boys to remove that signage

 

Here’s to a more gender equal year in 2015.

Belinda

Belinda Phipps
Fawcett Chair
07432 680079
[email protected]
www.fawcettsociety.org.uk