girl power! and a rant.

This is was the front page of the age on Thursday morning, the day after Julia Gillard was sworn in. Two women in the top jobs - girl power Australia, eh? (For those not in the know, I refer to our new PM and the Governor General Quentin Bryce).

This is excellent news (if a little bittersweet, I do feel for K Rudd). But - and here comes the soap box - while it's tempting to say this is big coup for women, we've still a long way to go. For example, did you know that violence against women is the number one cause of death, disability and illness for women 15-44 years in Victoria? For men, it's smoking. Actually, if you want to read some pretty horrifying stuff, look at the Vic Health Community Attitudes survey here. It's full of depressing information like 'more than a third of the community think that rape occurs because men cannot control their need for sex' and '22% of the community think domenstic violence can be excused if the perpetrator feels bad afterwards'. Hopefully, you think this is appalling - how often I assume everyone thinks the same as me (clearly, they do not - insert many John Howard faux pars*). Was that a big jump - from Gillard to violence... suffice to say, this has been on my chest, it is an emerging topic at Planet X.

On a more upbeat note, when Carney came home with the following yesterday, I had a familar feeling... something was definately on sale:

Kitty

*faux pas? fax par? (French for 'gaff')

** I'm not saying you, if you are a man, are a violent man. I'm not saying men don't experience violence. They do. But the numbers tell us that intiminate partner violence has a bigger burden on society and is overwhelmingly perpetrated by men against women they know in private spaces. Men are more likely to experience violence by men they don't know in public places.