There's been a lot of awareness raising on use of Photoshop to make women's bodies look impossibly beautiful. But what about in video?

Via Sarah at Uplift!, this showreel advertising work by post-production firm Room demonstrates how much 'correcting' is done to both women and men's bodies and faces in music videos.

You can see it here, or Sarah posted some stills on Uplift!

According to Arts Admin, Jane Arden's play "was the first theatre work to come out of the Women’s Liberation Movement in Britain when it was staged at the Drury Lane Arts Lab in 1969. To mark its 40th anniversary Unfinished Histories are staging a reading of the play followed by a roundtable discussion."

You can book tickets and get venue info here.

The staging of Vagina Rex and the Gas Oven is part of the Unfinished Histories project - you can read Red Chidgey's review of their CD about women's theatre troupes in the 1970s and 1980s here.

This study day will consider all aspects of writing for or about the screen by the large number of women involved in the British cinema industry of the silent era, whether as screenwriters, critics, columnists, publicists, or authors of source novels and plays. The day consists of screenings from the BFI National Archive, talks and workshops, followed by a screening of the rarely seen silent classic The Constant Nymph.Tickets £10 (day only), £15 including The Constant Nymph (Members pay £1.40 less)

More info here

One of the films, a hip hop and grime musical, 1 Day, directed by Penny Woolcock, has been at the centre of some controversy after Birmingham police intervention led to all the city's cinemas refusing to screen it.

BEV interviewed Woolcock:

I have no idea whether the police were under some sinister political pressure or whether they have decided to set themselves up as arbiters of what films we are allowed to see. The film has a 15 certificate!! It is far less violent than any Hollywood film or video game.

Sadly I think there is only one explanation. Racism. They are afraid of allowing young black people to gather to watch a film.

Also out tomorrow is Bright Star by Jane Campion - I interviewed the producer Jan Chapman last week about the film, which will be up along with a review as soon as I can get the time to write it :-)

Here in Oxford we’re all getting excited as we build up to Oxfordshire Reclaim the Night 2009. Tomorrow, straight after work, we’ll march from East Oxford across the bridge into the centre of town, through the evening crowds with our message that all women have the right to live without fear of violence. At the rally speakers will include the city council's domestic violence services co-ordinator, the co-ordinator of Oxford's rape crisis centre and a speaker from Amnesty International, with entertainment from performance poet Lizzie Mc and legendary punk folk heroine Maeve Bayton.

This is the second year the Oxfordshire RTN collective has organised a march that involves both students and local people, helped by funding from the city council. And that’s really important in Oxford. Because despite what you might expect in an age when universities are increasingly proud of their local engagement, etc, etc, there is still a pretty severe divide between ‘town and gown’ in the city. The divide is visible in lots of ways - the postcodes in the centre of the city include some of the wealthiest wards in the UK, with levels of education, income and health all exceeding the national average. But the postcodes out on the eastern edge of Oxford, near the industrial areas with the car plant (and the proposed site of England’s first council-run urban wind turbine), include wards that rank amongst the most highly deprived in the UK. But although students and residents are different in lots of ways, the risks of violence - by strangers, at home, through forced marriage, sexual coercion and sexual abuse - faced by all kinds of women make this one issue where we need to come together to show our strength.

And just as Oxfordshire RTN brings students and residents together, it also brings women and men together. Men who support the White Ribbon Campaign help out with organising the rally, and arrive early to have tea and biscuits ready for the women marchers (all women are welcome on the march, including trans women). They help design leaflets and make banners, and of course, with women on the march, the role of men as child carers is vitally important.

In some ways, Oxfordshire is a pretty lovely, safe place to live. We’ve got a strong network of domestic violence champions, supported by the city council - professionals in the courts, the police, the social services and the health service who look out for women experiencing violence and help to put them in touch with the support services they need. We’ve got OSARCC, who have been providing phone counselling and information services to women experiencing sexual abuse for 20 years. They even have paid workers! But we still have high rates of sexual violence, our rate of convictions for rape cases hovers around the national average and isn’t anything to shout about, and reports of rape regularly make the local papers, as they do everywhere in the country.

So like last year, we’re hoping that more than 150 women and men will come together - women on the march, men joining us at the rally - to educate the general public, raise the profile in the media (we were covered by every single local media outlet last year!) and support the year round work of OSARCC and the women’s anti-violence projects across Oxfordshire. Join us if you can!

(Edit: Vikki Chowney has posted a nice follow-up about an Oxfam event which involved four women talking about how climate change was changing their lives).

As Helen mentioned already, today is Equal Pay Day - the average pay gap between men and women is 17.1%, meaning that while men in work will be paid for the full year, women in work are effectively working for free from today until 2010.

A sobering thought! Shake Up Media has put together a fantastic graphic exploring the picture on unequal pay in more detail, comparing Haringay - in the top 10 on pay equality, with a gap of -2% - with Wokingham, in the bottom 10, with a pay gap of 31.7%. It's not the worst performer though - West Somerset has a staggering pay gap of 52.7%!

See the whole thing here

But it was not only the erosion of the Liberal government's big majority that made the by-election news in such papers as The New York Times but an incident at Boutcher School in Grange Road.

At 11am Alice Chapin, a 45 year old supporter of votes for women living in the West End, entered the polling station at the school. She broke a glass test tube on the ballot box and at that moment the presiding officer George Thorley felt the liquid on his face.

The chemical splashed one of Mr Thorley's eyes. Although examined at once by a doctor who happened to be present it was the view a month later of Guy's opthalmic surgeon Arthur Ormond that there might be a slight permanent haze to Mr Thorley's sight.

However, the victim believed that the injury to him was "purely accidental". Although his clothing was burnt he maintained that Mrs Chapin did not intend to hurt him.

"The first thing I did on receiving the splash was to go to a cupboard in the polling-room where there was some ammonia, used for chemical experiments in the school, intending to apply it to my burns. One of the polling clerks tried to dilute it for me, but I found his solution was too strong to use."

The 83 ballot papers in the box were later found to be damaged but all decipherable.

The Times reported that the 'suffragists' had "struck out a new form of annoyance" which was "childish malice characteristic of suffragette methods".

At the Old Bailey the following month Mrs Chapin was found guilty of interfering with the ballot box and sentenced to three months imprisonment. In addition she was found guilty of a common assault for which she received four months to run concurrently.

Also sentenced in the same court was Alison Neilans who tried to pour fluid into the ballot box at the Long Lane polling station. There were no injuries but two papers were rendered undecipherable and Miss Neilans was sentenced to three months in Holloway Prison along with her fellow conspirator.

Both women were members of the Women's Freedom League (WFL) which was a breakaway from the Women's Social & Political Union (WSPU).

The protest in Bermondsey was a direct response to the refusal of Prime Minister Herbert Asquith to receive a WFL deputation. Days later the League launched The Vote newspaper which declared: "We shall make a protest where our right is denied - in the polling booth where women ought to be voting."

(links added by me)

This one is local history for me; both of these incidents happened down the road from my flat.

Photo from Parliament, of a banner unfurled at another WFL protest - more info here.

Jessica Mann, an award-winning author who reviews crime fiction for the Literary Review, has said that an increasing proportion of the books she is sent to review feature male perpetrators and female victims in situations of "sadistic misogyny". "Each psychopath is more sadistic than the last and his victims' sufferings are described in detail that becomes ever more explicit, as young women are imprisoned, bound, gagged, strung up or tied down, raped, sliced, burned, blinded, beaten, eaten, starved, suffocated, stabbed, boiled or buried alive," she said.

"Authors must be free to write and publishers to publish. But critics must be free to say they have had enough. So however many more outpourings of sadistic misogyny are crammed on to the bandwagon, no more of them will be reviewed by me," said Mann, who has written her own bestselling series of crime novels and a non-fiction book about female crime writers.

She said that when a female corpse recently appeared on the jacket of a crime-writing colleague's new book, the author pointed out to her publisher that the victim in the story was actually a man. Mann said the publisher replied: "Never mind that. Dead, brutalised women sell books, dead men don't. Nor do dead children or geriatrics."

Some of these books (although not all) are written by women, the Guardian reports. But while Mann suggests this means there is no anti-feminist backlash involved, it doesn't seem so clear cut.

Natasha Cooper, former chair of the Crime Writers' Association, agreed with Mann. "There is a general feeling that women writers are less important than male writers and what can save and propel them on to the bestseller list is if they produce at least one novel with very graphic violence in it to establish their credibility and prove they are not girly," she said.

So one theory is it's a reaction to ... surprise, surprise... sexism directed at female writers.

While another theory is it's about commerical pressure:

Val McDermid, author of the books adapted for the television series Wire in the Blood starring Robson Green, whose novel The Mermaids Singing won the association's Gold Dagger for best crime novel of the year, said that crime writing was increasingly "sensationalist and gratuitous" because of the demands of the market.

"There has been a general desensitisation among readers, who are upping the ante by demanding ever more sensationalist and gratuitous plotlines," she said. "But when women write about violence against women, it will almost inevitably be more terrifying because women grow up knowing that to be female is to be at risk of attack. We write about violence from the inside. Men, on the other hand, write about it from the outside."

I am in the classroom tidying up with a pupil named Ellen. One of the advantages (and difficulties) of being a relatively young teacher is that sometimes children will talk to you in an unguarded way. You get to hear what they really think about things, which is usually fascinating and frightening in equal measure.

Today is no exception to that particular rule. Ellen is telling me that she is giving up chocolate for Lent. When I commend her self control and ask if her family are religious she looks at me with amusement and tells me that really, she just wants to lose a bit of weight. Sensing my perplexity she elaborates on the statement with disarming, resigned honesty. "I would be more popular if I were thinner," she sighs. Ellen is 10 years old.

During my experiences on the supply circuit I have been into a vast number of primary schools. And I have come to believe that there is a major and universal problem with the self-image of the little girls that populate them.

Click here to read on and comment

Refuge has come a long way since we opened the world’s first refuge in West London in 1971. What started off as a single house has grown into the country’s largest single provider of emergency accommodation and support to women and children escaping domestic violence.

On any one day we support over 1,000 women and children through our refuges and community outreach schemes. We operate services for children; counselling for abused women; a team of independent legal advocates and specialist services for women from minority ethnic communities. Refuge also runs the 24 hour national domestic violence helpline in partnership with Women’s Aid. Our political lobbying has been instrumental to the shift in the legal understanding of domestic violence and we also challenge social attitudes through award-winning public education campaigns.

Internship opportunities

Refuge is looking for capable and enthusiastic interns to provide a range of support in fundraising. Taking on an internship role at Refuge will not only provide personal development but also the opportunity to gain a wide range of work experience in a successful charity environment.

* Location: Refuge Head Office in central London
* Start date: ASAP
* Duration: 3 - 6 months
* Ideally, interns will work 3 days per week, although it may be possible to work 2
* Travel expenses provided
* Suitable for graduates or postgraduates
* Excellent IT and communications skills essential
* Candidates must have empathy with the aims and objectives of Refuge

To apply, please send a CV with covering letter (of no more than 2 A4 pages). Please outline any relevant experience including your reasons for applying for this post to: sonia_johal@refuge.org.uk

Please quote reference FW

The deadline for applications is 5pm, Monday 26 October 2009

For further information about Refuge, please see our website: www.refuge.org.uk

There was a memorable series devoted to Antonin Artaud, which included the phrase: "Artaud I couldn't have borne to know you alive your despair". Her art could also be riotously funny and sexy as well as macabre, and she made many works which dealt with female jouissance and eroticism, pleasure and pain. Spero was a spearhead of feminist art in the 1960s, calling for greater recognition of women artists and women in the New York art world. A recent show, Wack! Art and the Feminist Revolution, which I saw in New York a couple of years ago, revisited those turbulent times, and Spero's place in them. It should have come to Europe.

Spero was a vital, energetic artist. She never lost her curiosity in the world, nor her sense of anger at its injustices, and she found a way of making work which combined the graphic with installation, relevance and timelessness. She and Golub were partners for over half a century. I knew them since my first visits to New York in the late 1970s, and they were a unique and unguardedly generous double act. I owe something of my formation to this couple, who I once described as the conscience of the art world. And so they were.

Here are two videos showing two of her pieces, from a retrospective of Spero's work in Sevilla in 2007:

Le Guin is on the list of mindblowing science fiction by women & people of colour we linked to recently. You can read an interesting short story she wrote at Infinity Matrix, the seasons of the ansarac, (which appeared in Changing Planes, a collection of short stories roughly in which humans have discovered the ability to shift between different worlds through intense airport-induced boredom).

The Guardian also did a good interview with her a few years ago, which will make most sense for fans very familiar with her various creations.

They liven up this process with a series of slapstick photos of people in consumer-disaster situations, such as this guy whose jumper seems to have shrunk, a woman whose blender exploded and a man whose steering wheel came off:

Reader Laura wrote in to point out that the image Consumer Direct chose for their "after you buy" advice section is inexplicably a woman with a construction workers' helmet on, ear protection and... a bra?! What's the consumer disaster?!

As Laura points out:

Why a woman in a bra? How does that relate to anything?

Is it meant to represent something, or could they just not bring themselves to put together a whole site without a ubiquitous woman-in-her-underwear shot?

The only thing that springs to mind is the old saw, about stealing the shirt off someone's back. But if that's it, why the construction worker's gear?!

When I participated back in 2007, I set out why climate change is a feminist issue, and frankly I feel like I've covered this point a lot in the last couple of years. The number of blog posts and articles constantly expressing surprise that the words "women" and "climate change" are uttered in the same breath hasn't abated, but none the less, I want to move on from that a bit.

Instead, this is a good opportunity to look at some of the amazing feminist activism around climate change and environmental issues more generally, and get inspired for doing something ourselves. I've tried to pick out examples we've not highlighted on this site before - also, as Madre points out, it's also Rural Women's Day - as you can see from the list below, so often women's eco activism *is* rural women's action.

1. Origins of 'tree hugger'

The (sometimes dismissive, now mainstream) use of the term tree hugger to describe environmental activists originates with the Chipko movement in India in the 1970s, led by village women. Women in World History explains:

In the 1980s the ideas of the Chipko movement spread, often by women talking about them at water places, on village paths, and in markets. Women decided they were not powerless; there were actions they could take and a movement which would support them. Songs and slogans were created.

In one the contractor says:

“You foolish village women, do you know what these forest bear?
Resin, timber, and therefore foreign exchange!”

The women answer:

“Yes, we know. What do the forests bear?
Soil, water, and pure air,
Soil, water, and pure air.”

2. Vandana Shiva

No list like this could be complete with mentioning Vandana Shiva, an early and tireless ecofeminist. She was also active in the Chipko movement, (see above). Her books, including Staying Alive and Ecofeminism
have made a crucial contribution to ecofeminist thought and practice.

According to the UN's Who's Who of Women and the Environment:

In 1982, she founded the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology. This institute is dedicated to high quality and independent research to address the most significant ecological and social issues of our times, in close partnership with local communities and social movements. Initiatives of this foundation are the organic farming programme Navdanya, the Bija Vidyapeeth (or Seed University, International College for Sustainable Living), and 'Diverse Women for Diversity'.

The movement Navdanya focuses on biodiversity conservation and farmers' rights. 'Navdanya' means nine crops that represent India's collective source of food security. The main aim of the Navdanya biodiversity conservation programme is to support local farmers, rescue and conserve crops and plants that are being pushed to extinction and make them available through direct marketing. Navdanya is actively involved in the rejuvenation of indigenous knowledge and culture. It has created awareness on the hazards of genetic engineering, defended people's knowledge from biopiracy and food rights in the face of globalization. It has its own seed bank and organic farm spread over 20 acres in Uttranchal, northern India.

You can see some of the work her NGO Navdanya is doing on climate change here.

3. The Green Belt Movement

Nobel-prize-winner and the first woman in East or Central Africa to get a PhD, Wangari Maathai (left, photo by Mary Davidson) started the Green Belt Movement with the National Council of Women of Kenya, which has now planted more than 35 million trees.

The Independent ran a long profile of Maathai, explaining the whole story, which is well worth reading. About the origins of the Green Belt Movement, it says:

It was at this personal midnight that she returned to the small seeds she had begun to plant years before. She decided to urge women to plant whole forests. She wanted to see an entire new green belt across Kenya nurtured by women.

...

She managed to persuade international aid organisations to pay women a very small sum - around 2p - for successfully planting each tree. At first, local men scoffed. What could women do? How could they make trees grow? What did this belong in our traditions? But women were soon organising themselves from village to village into independent committees. "We started by planting trees, but soon we were planting ideas! We were showing women could be an independent force. That they were strong."

4. Setting the manifesto

The Women's Environment Network works here in the UK to raise awareness of climate change issues, and solidly carry on a wide range of campaigning work on environmental issues. In amongst all its interesting work on this issue, the network put together a landmark women's manifesto on climate change.

It is a great tool, totally useful for setting out why women have so much at stake in the climate change debate. Download it, read it, use it here.

5. Sailing the Waves on our Own

I know I already posted this not so long ago, but I had to include Ursula Rakova from the Carteret Islands, who formed Sailing the Waves on our Own, to relocate and rebuild people's homes in the face of rising sea levels, once it became clear that international help was not going to do the job.

6. Protest quilts

Another one I've only recently posted about, but the Asian Women's Quilt Protest really is inspiring. See this Rural and Indigenous Women's Statement on Climate Change for more background.

7. Bangladesh women's march

Back in November 2008, around 2,000 women took to the streets of Dhaka, in Bangadesh, wearing masks of G8 leaders, to call for action on climate change. (This photo is from Oxfam's Flickr stream)

These women, many of whom work breaking bricks or sewing garments for a living, took part in a mass rally in Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, last month [November] calling on leaders of the world’s leading industrial nations, the G8, to do more to help.

Donning masks representing G8 leaders, the crowd shouted out slogans calling on the world’s richest nations to do more to help.

Nearly 2,000 women workers from Dhaka wearing masks representing leaders of the world’s leading industrialized nations, the G8, called for richer nations to do more to help poorer countries like Bangladesh who’ve been affected by the negative impacts of climate change.

“Protect our agriculture, protect our country, protect our lives from the damaging effects of climate change”, they chanted, waving their fists to make their demands. They then took part in a short, but symbolic rally in the capital.

More photos of the protest at Caro's Choice.

8. La Via Campesina

Women from Via Campesina have done so much activism on environmental issues that it's hard to pick out a single example. Their women's committee statement from back in International Women's Day sets out where they're coming from:

As women farmers, we demand the respect of all our rights. We demand a life with dignity and without violence, and the respect of our sexual and reproductive rights. We struggle to achieve food sovereignty and to defend family farming, the only alternative to the current food and climate crises. We want a real agrarian reform and respect for biodiversity.

9. Climate Rush

Climate Rush is a women-led direct action group here in the UK, which holds protests which hark back to the suffragette movement.

Some of their actions include a "rush" on Parliament:

On 13th October 2008 1,000 women in sashes, men in costume and colourful creatures of all shapes and forms gathered in Parliament square. We were celebrating the centenary of the Suffragette Rush. After hearing inspirational speeches from Rosie Boycott, Joy Greasely (Women's Institute), Caroline Lucas MEP and more these Edwardian-decked women broke police lines, lightly vaulted makeshift barriers and rushed towards the doors of Parliament. Our fists banged against their closed doors and our Suffragette chants resounded through the Chamber as civil servants peered nervously through windows above - DEEDS NOT WORDS, DEEDS NOT WORDS. Our demands? No new coal power stations, an immediate stop to all airport expansion, and 80% reductions in carbon by 2050.

Since then, Climate Rush has held a protest picnic at Heathrow against the airport expansion plans, a sit in at the UK Coal Awards, they've glued themselves to the statue of Viscount Falkland - 100 years before, suffragette Marjory Hume chained herself to the sword on the statue.

I've been a bit critical of the failure of climate rush to highlight or really refer to the gendered impacts of climate change, while embracing the symbolism of the women's rights movements - and, well, I still think that. But this is still an example of great women-led climate activism.

You can read all about their latest exploits on their website.

Bonus!

The latest issue of SisterSong's magazine is focused on the links between environmental justice and reproductive justice

Girls Germs is a grrrl-tastic night of music, zines, cakes and dancing. Everybody who comes gets a free cupcake and a chance to buy zines from the fantastic We Are Words And Pictures zine stall. We'll be playing le tigre, Bratmobile, Sleater-Kinney, The Slits, The Kills, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Bikini Kill, M.I.A. and plenty of other amazing tunes by amazing grrrls. It's going to be a celebration of women's creativity, proof that girls making music is more than just a faddy trend.

More importantly, though Girl Germs is a grrrl-safe zone where we won't have to listen to degrading song lyrics. Girl Germs was partly born out of frustration; we were sick of having to dance to songs all about male-angst, or that referred to women only as objects to be abused or put up on pedestal. We wanted to throw ourselves about to music that related our experiences, made by women who are like us. We know there are other women in London who feel the way we do but they're hard to find. We've started Girl Germs in the hope that we'll meet you, collaborate with you and dance with you. And eat some cake with you.

Date: Saturday 17th October

Location: Camden Head Pub, 100 Camden High Street

Time: 8 'til late

Price: £3/£2 with flyer

The Feminism in London conference, now in its second year, was an opportunity to bring together intergenerational, interfaith, black, white and minority ethnic women and men from various backgrounds, mainly based in London, but at times hailing from across the country and the EU.

Though the highly anticipated event wavered a little a week before it occurred due to some problems with clarity on whether trans women would be welcome at a women-only labelled workshop, it brought a buzzing crowd of hundreds of women and men together from 9.30am until 5.00pm.

The event circled around three panels with no limit on attendance, on: racism and sexism, what's wrong with prostitution, and motherhood and poverty, and nine smaller workshops, covering pro-feminist men, media training, rape and sexual violence, self-defence and activism training, among other things. My focus of the conference was on the main hall and the Q&A panels so I can't testify as to the points of interest in the workshops, or the outcomes.

Click here to read on and comment

A list of charities including Amnesty, the NSPCC, End Child Prostitution and Trafficking and the Poppy Project have signed a letter urging the Met to keep its unit. The BBC reports:

In their letter, they say: "Human trafficking is a complex, sensitive issue.

"Given the continually evolving nature of the crime, it has taken the Human Trafficking Team and Non-Governmental Organisations working in the field a number of years to develop their expertise in the area.

"Policing trafficking for forced labour, domestic servitude and all other forms of exploitation requires specialist knowledge and understanding of trafficking, dedicated resources and commitment."

'Financial pressures'

The charities also warn that when London plays host to the 2012 Olympics it could become even more of a magnet for the traffickers because experience shows that where large number of people gather there is an increased demand for sexual services.

...

A Met Police spokesman said it had been conducting a review about its response to "all organised immigration crime and trafficking".

"This has yet to be ratified but proposes clubs and vice [team] have enhanced resources and take over trafficking for sexual exploitation investigations."

It sounds very much like Kate Allen from Amnesty is right when she speculates this could lead to trafficking people into forced labour and domestic servitude risks being forgotten, and even when it comes to trafficking for sexual exploitation "there's a danger that transferring responsibility for combating trafficking to other police teams will mean that hard-earnt expertise will be lost within the police".

Mary Honeyball has started a petition to save the unit, which will be presented to Sir Paul Stephenson, the Met Police commissioner.

I have been a critic for 16 years, across all arts disciplines and all media. It is simply not true that there are not enough women artists, commentators, writers and critics to achieve parity in arts events, whether they are poetry festivals or radio programmes. I used to present a radio show in which, a number of times, there were six male guests and no women, "just by accident". The majority of times there was one woman. We discussed virtually no works created by women artists, writers or thinkers. Not once were there all women guests, "just by accident".

It fills me with ice cold rage. Men and women both like to worship men, for some reason; women even, perversely, love to promote men who themselves hate women (hello, Roth'n'Updike fans. How's it going?). Both sexes unquestioningly perpetuate the boys' club through the invites issued to men, the opportunities, associations, deals and chances offered. The talks, readings, colloquia, special trips, lectures and guest spots are organised by women for the benefit of men's careers. For the men, the glory, status, visibility, influence and enshrinement in history. For the women, the expected but unacknowledged work.

I've spent the last six weeks making documentaries that involved interviewing several prominent male artists. Their teams of assistants, PRs and administrators were always all female, efficient, intelligent and erudite - in galleries that almost never show women artists' work. The men themselves rarely bothered even to look me in the eye when I was interviewing them. These men did not respect women, and enacted that disrespect blatantly in every encounter with women. They never, ever name-checked women writers, artistic, politicians or thinkers as influences. Yet we women helped their careers.

This problem isn't just confined to the world of art and literature of course; I see the same thing at press conferences and other work events. It's unusual to see more than one woman on stage, if that, and almost all PR and admin jobs are done by women.