Imagine if we had a female Prime Minister/President… now imagine if she put together an über think tank to develop ideas for the future direction of the country and everyone on it was a leader in their field… and everyone also just happened to be female.. except one, George Clooney. Might men feel a little marginalised by that?
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s brainiac idea for a committee to lead his Australia 2020 Summit includes a climate change expert, a bank chief executive, an international security expert, a former deputy prime minister, a World Vision Australia head, and … Cate Blanchett!
Yeah, that Cate Blanchett, the star who was just up for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars, and who didn’t win either. Yadda yadda she is also artistic co-director of the Sydney Theatre Company, but the. only. woman. on. the. Summit. committee? Really? Prime Minister, you couldn’t even muster a token gesture for us?
For all those who won’t be invited to the Summit, the online community created a wiki called Oz Ideas to be our forum to list and vote on the best ideas to improve Australia. It’s free and anonymous. The site just acts as a national online brainstorming session. It’s at http://ozideas.wetpaint.com. There are specific sections for each issue.
Since the public often needs a bit of entertainment to go with their public engagement, there is a fun video on Youtube of Kevin Rudd break dancing with his other white blokey friends. It’s at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQZa17-Dt_4. See what you think, and if you like it, let others know about both the site and the video.
Cheers,
I agree that we’re hopelessly underrepresented. But I’m not upset to be represented by Cate Blanchett. She’s very clever, can put her ideas together coherently, and god it’s good to see a pregnant woman working in the public eye.
I was worried this would happen. It’s a shame to see it has.
Women are half the country! And more than that, we’re a country of many cultures!!! Can we have some representation here? Jeez.
What a load of nonsense. Cate is on a steering committee that will select up to 100 of the 1000 participants at the summit – many of whom will be women and will I’m sure do a wonderful job of representing both their sex, their culture and their country. Which is more than I can say for this blog.
Hi Bluemilk
Have you read about the federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner’s Listening Tour? Elizabeth Broderick is currently travelling around the currently seeking community input into her equality agenda for her five year term. There is a blog where members of the public can have their say on the three themes of the Tour:
- Economic independence for women
- Work and family balance over the lifecycle
- Freedom from discrimination, harassment and violence.
Can you please encourage your readers to visit http://www.humanrights.gov.au/listeningtour to have their say on gender equality.
The Commissioner has also posted a blog entry about the Australia 2020 summit urging women to nominate themselves.
I suppose if you randomly selected 10 people at the top of their fields, it is quite plausible it might well result in 9 out of 10 of them being men. This situation is what we need to fix. I don’t know how you balance picking the most influential with sensible representation, but I am fairly confident the answer is not 9 out 10 being white boys.
Hey Mike, I love an argument that supports its own opposite position. Thanks, you’ve made my afternoon.
I agree that we’re hopelessly underrepresented. But I’m not upset to be represented by Cate Blanchett. She’s very clever, can put her ideas together coherently, and god it’s good to see a pregnant woman working in the public eye.
Cate Blanchett is completely gobsmackingly awesome; I don’t care, she’s a bloody actress. The only “portfolio” headed by a woman: Creative Australia. Cities, energy, tertiary education, science, climate change – men. This is stereotyping at its worst.
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Mike – I take it we can count on your support for the “George Clooney nomination” when the eventual time comes for a female Prime Minister.
What the?
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