By Tanya Diesel – 08.03.16
Today is the celebration of women, the power of an equal and integrated society, where men and woman walk arm in arm to build greatness in our society!
UN Women’s day event in Sydney hosted three powerful and deeply caring panelists – Elizabeth Broderick (former Sex Discrimination Commissioner, global advocate for women’s human rights), Tura Lewai (Fiji national on UN Secretary General’s Network of Male Leaders) and Sister Lorraine Garasu (from PNG, awarded an Order of Australia). Liz brought forward again the need to speak and act against domestic violence and the horrifying stories about how prevalent this terrible act is. Tura talked about how men are the problem and that we must all be super vigilant about what we are doing to ‘enable’ discrimination against women; small and large acts that undermine the power and equality of women. Lorraine talked about how much work there is to be done in education and services, she is an inspiring and tireless worker for peace, women and families.
The great thing is that awareness is up, we are talking more about the more difficult aspects and men are involved and driving this too!
The tough thing is we are still in a world of terrible inequality, not just regarding gender. We keep hearing stories that are just too frightening in order to shock us into some awareness beyond ourselves, some movement to solve this.
I am heartbroken by the terror and pain inflicted on women and girls. This is about our humanity, our care and our love of ourselves and life, the preciousness of life!
So Einstein said (loosely quoted): “the thinking that got us into this mess is not the thinking that will get us out of it”. So we need to raise our level of thinking, our consciousness, in order to solve this; great and courageous acts that start a movement and we all get swept up by them and there is no other way to think other than about equality and humanity.
Our call to action is – raise your level of thinking, challenge your mindset and ask yourself what are you doing to limit your thinking so you can get out of your own way to release more acceptance, respect and love.