My first blog on the NEC! Brilliant.

Well, as we approach the end of the month, I should update all you feministas and other interested parties on what the new National Women’s Officer has been up to so far in July….

In short I have been doing the following:

Women’s Priority Campaigning, Campaign Planning, and Committee

- Women’s Committee Induction (which I held at the Women’s Library in London which is brilliant. You should go there.. www.londonmet.ac.uk/thewomenslibrary).

- Drafting and facilitating discussion over the Women’s Campaign priorities and plan 06-07! It’s going to be utterly ace, don’t you worry about that.

- Scheduling meetings with various potential partners including Amnesty International, the Women’s Library, Action for South Africa, the London Feminist Network, Women’s Aid, Abortion Rights etc etc etc.

Society and Citizenship stuff (I’m the co-convenor of this Zone, along with Jamal)

- Held our first meeting, which was interesting and challenging, about what sort of things we might prioritise

- Drafting the plans and possible priorities so that we can all discuss them at our next meeting

Other stuff:

- Liberation 2006!

This event went really well, I thought. Here is the quiz I did at my workshop (email me for answers!).

- Abortion Rights ‘Speak out event’ (House of Commons)

I went along to the AR speak out and spoke out about my abortion, along with loads of other women. The event was about demystifying popular and stereotypical notions of ‘women who have abortions’. MP’s and others listened as actual women spoke about why they needed access to abortion, and how they felt about it. You know, considering that 1 in 3 pregnancies end in abortion, there are hardly any women prepared to speak out about it. Why? Because of the social stigma that is still associated with the fact that millions of women make choices about their bodies - ‘shock horror!’. Also, many women are actually frightened to speak out because of the horrific ‘campaigning’ tactics used by some Anti-Choice organisations. IT ENDS HERE. I’ll be working with Abortion Rights all year combating stigma, and reasserting a woman’s right to choose!

- Went to NEC Induction

This was a really amazing training event and I have a really strong feeling like ‘this is going to be a great year for NUS’. Let’s see shall we!

Anyway, I wanted to end this first blog on something that really inspired me at Liberation 2006! In my workshop, we did some group work around ‘Feminism’. Officers were asked to discuss what they would say to somebody who said to them ‘I believe in equal rights for women, but I don’t like to call myself a feminist’. Then we had a discussion about the term feminism. By the end of the day 5 separate people came to me to say that they would now be calling themselves feminists. This is what it’s all about – confronting issues like the ‘F’ word head on with people. People aren’t stupid, and we need to all remember that when we are all growing up not many people’s parents/teachers etc bother to say to them ‘by the way, sexism, racism, homophobia, classism, and disablism are going to be part of your life’!

Remember: the day when ‘Feminism’ becomes an unproblematic term, is the day when we have won equality between women and men.

FEMINISTS OF THE WORLD…BE PROUD!

Here for you…

Don’t hesitate to get in touch with me throughout the year. If you need me, I’ll be on your campuses, helping you with your campaigns, helping us win nationally and locally. I’ll be able to help you set up a Women’s Officer, Women’s Group, or Anti-Sexism society for the first time.

Please don’t think that you have to be a Sabb or official Union officer to contact me either. If you are a student in this country and you are a woman, I am here for you!

Kat

xx

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