On the Coast – Families Issue 99 I April/May 2019 | Page 20

Equality begins at home
and benefits all
by Sarah Tolmie
U
nless you have been off grid,
under a rock or on a total
social media detox you cannot be
missing the debates and discourse
around #metoo, women’s rights
and gender equality.
In fact, in the last few years there has
been a steady flow of discontent which
now seems like a veritable tsunami of
outrage. Women are fed up. And I am
one of them.
I feel like as I edge closer to 50 I am
becoming, as actress Ashley Judd at
the outbreak of the Harvey Weinstein
Hollywood scandal proudly declared
herself to be, an ‘angry woman’!
Seriously, after 60 years of the
feminism movement, why is there still
a gender pay gap? Why is abortion still
illegal? How can it be that women still
face glass ceilings?
And don’t get me started on the
so called ‘feminine’ professions that
are now more than ever vulnerable
to being reduced to part-time and
contract employment, if not completely
abandoned into the wilds of the gig
economy.
There are rising rates of female
incarceration which explode off the
chart for our indigenous sisters. Our
girls still suffer harassment and sexual
objectification. Some things seem to be
going backwards – we’ve been lulled into
an illusion we were living in progress –
but some shadow gremlins never left and
are now emerging to scare us again.
For example, not only do women still
bear the bulk of the burden of child-
rearing and domestic duties, she also has
assumed an undue ‘emotional-load’ in
domestic partnerships. This manifests
with the burden of holding the big family
‘picture’, micromanaging the schedules
and diaries, and directing and delegating
tasks TO husbands to do. All this starts to
become an overwhelming beast of burden
on top of their own work/life balance.
At the first rise up of our voices, and
pushback on the norms, a small yet
20
KI DZ O N T H E C OA ST
powerful group of men bristle and cry
reverse discrimination. They not only
actively deny the existence of ‘privilege’
and systemic inequality but, in fact, double
down efforts to “keep us in our place”.
Only recently on International
Women’s Day did our Prime Minister say
he was all for equality “as long as it is not
at the expense of others [ie men]”.
Watch out gals, Gilead is possible.
It is time for a new rising up. A rising
up for not only our girls but for our boys
too. A world of inequality does not serve
them either and I see this at the coal
face in my practice when couples come
for marriage therapy. This war is being
fought in the trenches of the domestic
division of labour and parenting, making
both men and women unhappy and
putting families at risk.
Humanity wins when we encourage
all to rise up to our highest potential.
As a mother of sons, I’ve always
accepted my role (and my husband’s role
too by the way) was to guide them into
being good men. Men who loved and
respected women. Men who contributed
and didn’t differentiate or discriminate.
But a recent conversation with my not
so little ones now, Master 19 and Master
16, left me shocked at their belief that
feminism is viewed with ridicule and as
out of date, we don’t need it anymore,
‘there is no inequality’. I was shocked. They
truly can’t see it. It is invisible to them.
And so there is more work to be done.
This evolution begins at home. It’s time
for the conversation to be shifted to
understand women’s rights and gender
equality as benefitting all. Redressing
the balance for women is not a women’s
rights’ issue any more but an issue for
humanity.
How might this look for us in the
home? What could this ‘revolution’ at the
grass roots level of real families look like?
It’s about shifting men’s and women’s
mindsets towards the acceptance that the
home and domestics is a shared family
environment. Child rearing is a whole of
family responsibility.
It might mean a more conscious
effort to bring boys into the kitchen and
showing them how to do the laundry. It
might mean taking daughters into the
shed and exposing them to car repairs
and mowing the lawn.
Mums and dads let’s advance the EQ
and empathetic muscles of young men
by not stifling emotional expression for
boys and stamping out their feelings and
natural tenderness, not curbing their
creativity, but rather building for boys
and girls a new emotional literacy.
How great will the day be when
girls aren’t judged on their cuteness,
prettiness and bodies or directed solely
into caretaking and service roles and
professions? Let’s affirm girls for their
actions, character and ability. Let’s
encourage and widen their dreams.
Moving forwards, to ensure ongoing
advances, our society will require for
women and men to develop a zero
tolerance for anything less than equal.
It will need a new ‘language’ which
might need to become less ‘gendered’.
It will need a new willingness to open
hearts towards ideals of compassion,
collaboration and the co-creative
potentials of both and girls.
Let it be for our generation of kids to
enjoy a society where there is universal
equality and acceptance and when
we all work together building up our
strengths...we all win.
Sarah Tolmie is a Life & Love celebrant, coach, pastoral carer and consultant assisting people to
celebrate, navigate, grow and heal through all their life & love transitions. Her practice focuses on love
& relationships; families & children; life success & fulfilment; illness, death & grief. As an holistic Celebrant
Sarah creates profound and meaningful ceremonies for all life & love events. Sarah is also a Laughter
Yoga Practitioner. You can visit her website www.sarahtolmie.com.au and receive her Daily Love
updates on her Facebook page at Sarah Tolmie – Life & Love