Julia Gillard 's Misogyny Speech

“Speaking to you today, I speak for them, just as each of us speaks for women around the world who are denied the chance to go to school, or see a doctor, or own property, or have a say about the direction of their lives, simply because they are women”(Clinton 1). These words spoken by Hillary Rodham Clinton in her speech, “Women’s Rights are Human Rights,” on September 5, 1995. Hilary pressured the Chinese government and the world to address the problems women face everyday go unresolved because they are ignored. Her speech is one that is still relevant today and has affected the world by inspiring other countries to proclaim their opinions on women's rights. Hillary uses many cases of rhetorical devices that include, parallelism, ethos, pathos,

On September 5, 1995, Hillary Clinton delivered an influential speech at The Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. Clinton expresses general concern over escalating violence toward women, in other word’s gendercide. “Gendercide refers to the systematic elimination of a specific gender group, normally female. It’s most common in India, China, and other regions in Southeast Asia” (GirlsKind Foundation). Crimes, such as bride trafficking, infanticide, abandonment, and dowry related murder; often take place within private households, going unnoticed and not even acknowledged. “Tragically, women are most often the ones whose human rights are violated. Even now, in the late 20th century, the rape of women continues to be used as an

Allowing women to vote, wage increases, employment and parental leave have been major winning battles for women in Australia and all around the world, but the fights not over yet. Equal representation in politics is a new critical battle that must be tackled head on. It is essential for women to be able to express their opinions on the political course of Australia.

Overall, the representation of elected women now stands at about 25 % at each level of government, including on municipal councils, in provincial/territorial legislatures and at federal level. (Parliament of Canada, 2016) With this significant gender parity in politics, the paper examines the causes of the under-representation of Canadian women in politics. Findings are based on scholarly articles and their analyzed data on why do fewer Canadian women run for political office. When taken together, the results presented in this paper argues that (1) unwelcoming environment (women and family unfriendly working environment) with lack of support in political engagement, (2) women’s experience of exclusion, paternalism and systemic discrimination in political realm, and (3) media’s portrayal of women as to be marginalized by the society are what cause Canadian women to be under-represented in politics. Finally, the paper raises an interesting question from the topic of gender disparity into further discussion of the discrimination within discriminated group women other than those privileged ones who are likely to be selected in public

It is also evident that since female and male candidates are equally qualified for political positions and have the same success rate in elections, the gender gap can be explained through the lack of female participation in elections. Many governments, including the Canadian government, have contemplated introducing quota systems to reduce the scope of the gender gap and ensure female representation in parliament. However, in a democratic system, quotas can be viewed as a “violation of liberal democracy” because they favour a specific people group (“50% Population”). The solution, therefore, rests in the hands of the next generation of female leaders. It is up to young, educated women to embrace Virginia Woolf’s parting message in her essay A Room of One’s Own of acquiring “a room of [their] own” (Woolf 4). In other words, young women are faced with the task of developing a sense of independence and having the “habit of freedom and the courage” in order to pursue a career in politics (Woolf 112). Even though there are initiatives in universities aimed prepare women to run for politics such as the She Will Run, it is essential to acknowledge that gender parity in the political environment will not be achieved automatically ("50% Population”). As instructed by Woolf, young women must move past stereotypes, suppress

Verba and his co-authors examine the import of participation, both voting and non-voting, in our American society. According to their argument, the typical citizen activist “tend[s] to be drawn disproportionately from more advantaged groups–to be well-educated and well-heeled and to be White and male” (Verba et al., 1995: 231). Indeed, Verba et al. explore participation along both gender and racial lines and concludes that both women and minorities are comparatively less active than men, especially white men, who stand peerless both in terms of affiliation with a political organization, contributing to a campaign, contacting their Representatives, and more direct forms of participation like voting.

This speech drastically enhances women’s status by drawing government’s attention, which enforces women’s equality and human rights both domestically and internationally. In fact, more women are employed year by year. In 2009, over 8.1 million women were employed in Canada, which is double the number of women employed three decades ago; in 2009, 28% of the women aged 25 to 54 have a bachelor or postgraduate university degree in Canada, which is more than double the proportion twenty years ago. Although there is still a long way to go for women to be truly treated equally, Clinton’s speech in 1995 definitely gave an initiating

Prior to 1921, men were the only members of the Canadian parliamentary system. With the first Canadian women being elected into the Canadian parliament in 1921, women have had the ability to participate and become elected into the House of Commons. Since then, Canadian women’s participation in the House of Commons has substantially increased from 1 female seat holder in 1921 to the present day 64 seats held by women. Although this increase is seemed as substantial, the debate about the underrepresentation of women in politics has been a central topic of debate by politicians, scholars and the general public in Canada. Although it is widely agreed that representation of women in the House of Commons needs to increase, there are two

Within the first few paragraphs, the author uses an abundance of textual evidence to demonstrate the progression and downfalls of gender equality throughout the years. For instance, in 2004, the Howard Government used the Marriage Act to refer to marriage as ‘the union

Reserve the few important portfolios for the women-------- female ministers are typically given ‘feminine’ portfolios, such as education, health, social welfare or environment. Moreover, governments do not consider gender equality as a priority, gender equality issues are missing from the budgeting process, and women are not present in the financial, peace, and international negotiations, structures and delegations. The participation of a proportion of women in government in all levels should be established as one of the rules of democracy. All governments should thus include a proportion of women. Men and women alike are fitted to hold government

The discussions about voting and women’s participation in politics soon led to the examining about society’s views on men and women and their differences (Rampton).

It is argued that Julia Gillard’s ‘misogyny speech’, delivered before Parliament on the 9th of October 2012, was the result of systematic gender bias present in the Australian psyche. The ‘misogyny speech’ was launched against the then Opposition Leader Tony Abbott, highlighting sexist and misogynistic observations the leader had made in the past. Since the second-wave feminist movement of the 1970s, renowned commentators have discussed the negative contrast between the depiction of men and women in the public sphere. Examining the representation of women in politics, combined with their negative portrayal in the media, it is clear gender inequality is thriving.

When Sylvia Bashevkin wrote “ the higher, the fewer” it was to indicate a pattern in women's political participation. The number of women in politics drops as one moves upward to the upper tiers of government, federal or provincial. The gap between the number of women involved in politics to the number of women in the country is still too wide. Over half the population is female and yet less than 25% were Members of Parliament in 2011. As of 2016 only 31% of senators were female. This gap highlights the need to continue to pursue the feminist movement.

The Women’s Liberation Movement greatly impacted Australia and the United States throughout the 60’s and 70’s carrying on to the 90’s. Without the Women’s Liberation Movement women wouldn’t have received changes in laws primarily regarding employment impacting on them moving forward in terms of equal opportunities. However there is still a there is still process to be made concerning employment and social roles for women to have equal rights as men. The Women’s Liberation Movement started in the 60’s during the second wave of feminism. Even though the 70’s were a time of change, both Australia and the United States saw women remaining in low status roles and staying primarily in the domestic sphere. The 90’s however saw a dramatic change in the amount of women employed and working more so in the domestic sphere.

New Zealand was the first country to give women the right to vote in 1893, however, since then we have dropped to 27th when it comes to gender representation in government, out of 188 countries. One of the many reasons as to why women are under represented in parliament can be linked to the issue of the political obstacles that face women. This is when they want to be in parliament, women whom are in parliament, and the many women who this is not an option for due to lack of opportunity. Women have to face this “masculine model” of politics and government. Men are dominant in parliament, meaning that political life revolves around male norms and values (Shvedova). This can be extended, politics is very much about competition and confrontation. Rather than politics being